


A Means of Survival

by lastcrazyhorn



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Adoption, Aphrodisiacs, Book 2: Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, Chan, Child Abuse, Drug Addiction, F/M, Fear, First Time, Insomnia, M/M, Mental Breakdown, Minor Character Death, Missing Persons, Nightmares, PTSD, Rape Recovery, Rape/Non-con References, Recreational Drug Use, Unofficial Sequel, Violence, evil!Dumbledore, magical castration
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-09
Updated: 2012-06-09
Packaged: 2017-11-07 09:09:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 69
Words: 203,320
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/429321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lastcrazyhorn/pseuds/lastcrazyhorn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Semi-sequel to Amanuensis's "Other Chambers, Darker Secrets." Snape never hurt Harry or Ron in this AU. Shows what happens to the trio's lives after their world has been trashed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Changes

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Other Chambers, Darker Secrets](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/9090) by Amanuensis. 



> This is a semi-sequel to the story by Amanuensis called "Other Chambers, Darker Secrets." In THAT story, Lucius rapes Harry, Draco rapes Hermione and Snape rapes both Ron and Harry. 
> 
> However, my story is a semi-sequel, because my premise is that Snape only helped them and never hurt any of them, while Draco was the one to hurt Ron. I also received permission from Amanuensis to write this. 
> 
> This fic was my first foray into fanfiction back in 2009.

They had been the Gryffindor trio from the get go. Now however, things were different, and even Neville Longbottom could tell you that without too much undue fuss. No one except a handful of people knew why, other than the trio itself of course, but trying to ask them about it was like trying to get a hippogriff to be nice after insulting its mother – not a real great idea, all told.

Harry had been right when he had realized that the previous part of his life was over and that he'd never be able to get it back. Lucius had made him see that truth, and it seemed now that no matter what thoughts he had, he could never get that particular one out of the forefront of his mind.

They had stuck together after it had been all said and done, like they said that they would. Physically, they were healed, but mentally and emotionally – well, that was an entirely different kind of story.

***  
The first change that they had been forced to implement had been their sleep routines. Being second years, they were versed in some basic silencing spells, but nothing complex. Unbeknownst to Ron, Harry had been using them on his sleeping area every night since the beginning of the school year. His dreams that year had been plagued by locked rooms, dead bodies, and his Uncle Vernon's laughter as he pleaded and begged through the door to be let out.

Before they had gone to sleep that first night after Snape had secured their release, they had discussed that silencing spell as perhaps a proper method of self-insurance for when they were alone in their beds at night. Harry and Ron were most worried about Hermione, since she was alone; they at least had each other to turn to if things got too bad.

But she had reassured them, in a most Hermione-like knowing way. She was so very strong.

…

It wasn't very long into the night before they realized that they would have to revise their plans and learn some heftier silencing spells. Harry had shrieked loudly enough to awaken the Gryffindor dorm, male _and_ female, including Professor McGonagall herself. Indeed, the next day at breakfast, the rumor that a banshee had been let loose in the castle in the middle of the night had made it through most of the rest of the houses before Hermione's cereal had had a chance to get properly soggy. In turn, the Gryffindor house was remarkable tightlipped about the whole sordid affair, thanks to a dressing down that had occurred early that morning by a very harassed and upset looking head of house.

The trio had not slept the rest of the night, opting instead to focus on their "homework," as they had told anyone who had bothered to ask. It simply wasn't safe enough to sleep until they had learned a better method of concealment from their dorm mates. Unlike their heartfelt and teary promise to stick together, this agreement had been silent, but somehow more emphatic. This was the real deal, as it were.

They considered dreamless sleep as an option, but as Harry had already realized, it was possible to build up immunity to dreamless sleep to the point that it no longer worked properly, if at all, resulting in the need for stronger and stronger doses until what? Death? Madness? Besides, unless they wanted to learn to brew it themselves, then it was likely that their increasing consumption would be noticed by someone sooner, rather than later.

No, a stronger silencing spell was the easiest way to hide their trauma from the eyes and ears of the rest of the school. It wasn't anybody else's business. There was simply just no one that they could trust to this magnitude, and still have their revenge upon those whom had hurt them so very badly.

"Yeah mum, by the way . . .," Ron had joked sourly to his two best mates when the idea of telling someone had been brought up once more. He still hadn't told Harry about what had happened in the hallway between him and Draco, but knew that Harry likely considered the act of having to have been a passive witness in all that had gone on as horrible enough in and of itself, and therefore had not said anything to him about it.

While Hermione and Ron both hadn't wanted to deal with the fallout of telling their parents, the idea of telling the Dursleys about their situation was so laughable that Harry had accidentally exploded a nearby toilet at the mere _utterance_ of the idea. Luckily it had been a toilet from the bathroom that Moaning Myrtle inhabited, so there was no particular problem there.

Likewise, the idea of just sleeping in the common room in shifts, with someone constantly awake to monitor the other two's sleep, was also tossed out, given the increased likelihood of drawing unwanted attention.

….

It took a total of three days of constant searching in the library for answers to their desperate question in order to find something even remotely good enough. In that time, they had only taken catnaps in the place of real sleep, while loading up extensively on Pepper Up Potions and coffee; the former being taken carefully from the infirmary in the dead of night under Harry's invisibility cloak.

Thus far, no one had said anything to them, but Harry had caught the headmaster looking at the three of them with something akin to wary concern more than a few times in those three days. Between their efforts at continuing alertness and their sagging studies, the added fear of being called into Dumbledore's office was almost enough to send him around the bend. It had only been the constant support of his two most precious friends which had kept him from diving into the lake in hopes of becoming added protein to the giant squid's sordid diet.

And then they had found something. Ironically, given their history of research, Hermione had not been the one to read across it first, but Ron had been able to give out the exclamation.

"I've got _IT_ ," he had whispered with the bloodshot desperation of extreme fear and near-complete hopelessness.

They had both looked up at him with piercing glares before realizing that he _was_ one of them, and as such, was allowed to interrupt their endless solitude and misery.

"Read it," Harry had said tersely, his teeth clenched to keep the tremors of his overwrought body from becoming audible.

"The spell was created to initially to shield a master's household from the screams of those in labour." Ron read, breathlessly. Had Ron been anything resembling his former self, he would have been disgusted or at least embarrassed by the idea of using a spell that had been originally created for shielding the cries of a mother-to-be. Now however, an exceptionally different Ron sat there in his place. The old Ron had never experienced the heat of his most hated classmate's orgasm dripping out of his shaking arsehole. No, the old Ron had _nothing_ on this Ron.

"What's the spell?" Harry had asked once more, a bit more tersely this time. His knuckles were white with the strain of being upright and alive in a place as open as the library. After all, _anyone_ could get in there.

"Ah," Ron squinted at the print, " _Silencio a Nevita._ "

Hermione had taken the book from Ron by that point and had been scanning it quickly with a renewed fervor. Finally she breathed a sigh of relief and look up at them nodding her agreement at its worth. She had not spoken since the middle of their second sleepless day, and secretly Ron and Harry had a bet going over when and how she would finally attack Draco Malfoy. Harry had given her to the end of the week and put his money on her attacking Draco physically, in an eye-gouging, knee to the groin kind of manner. Ron, on the other hand, had put his money on sometime in the next day, but had suggested that she would someone find a spell that would render Malfoy dick-less in the process.

Now it seemed that neither would occur, provided that the spell worked. And god, it had better, before they all just started screaming and hexing everything around them. And then _something_ would come out, and not for the better. Harry could just imagine his awful title being changed to "The-Boy-Who-Lived-to-get-Fucked." And then his life would just spiral out of control, he just knew it. It was too much to bear, too much to handle, too much too much too much. He dug his nails into the inside flesh of his left arm, gouging out thin furrows of skin from his thin arms. His body ached with a subdural itch that nothing could reach. He just wanted a way to scour himself clean, but nothing worked. His body screamed at him to let it sleep and he was almost to the point of screaming back that it just needed to fuck off and leave him alone. He was _almost_ there.

But this, this " _Silencio a Nevita;"_ this could work, he felt certain. Why else would they have found the spell now, at the end of the third day, at the end of their unraveling sanities? It _had_ to be right.

It just had to be.

….

Hermione went to sleep first, without even making sure that they knew how to say the spell correctly, which was very unlike her. The two boys had raised eyebrows at each other, but otherwise had not said anything when she had motioned wearily towards the girls' side of the tower.

"Maybe we should stay up for a bit then, mate," Ron had said, as he lowered himself carefully into a semi-slumped position on the couch.

"A bit," Harry had agreed, perching on the arm farthest away from Ron. Even now, in the state that he was, his eyes continuously scanned the room warily for some kind of attack. Even _here_ , in the closest thing that he knew to a home, he still kept his eyes open and his wand ready. Although it was already ten o'clock at night, there were still several study groups left in the common area. They mostly consisted of older members of the Gryffindor house, but all seemed to be aware of the changed atmosphere around Harry, Ron and Hermione. No one approached either of the two boys for the next hour, but there were several worried glances in their direction, not unlike Dumbledore's looks had been in the Great Hall.

After an hour of what felt like fruitless waiting on the boys' parts, they finally decided that the new silencing spell was working. Normally it would take longer than an hour for any of them to reach REM sleep, but after three days of no sleep coupled with extreme trauma, they all believed that they would reach their dreams sooner rather than later.

So with some trepidation, they made their way up to their beds, before lying down stiffly, each boy ensconced behind the privacy of his bed curtains. None of the other second year boys had gone to sleep yet, and although all but Seamus were in the room with them, no one spoke to them.

Harry silently counted to three, aware that Ron was probably doing the same thing, as it had been one of the things that they had discussed quietly while still down in the common room. Then he muttered the spell and miraculously he realized that the world had gone miraculously still and quiet around him. The book had indicated that the spell should work in two ways in order to guarantee absolute privacy for the birthing process itself. Those around him would not be able to hear him, nor would he be able to hear them. It seemed a fair trade-off to him.

Having decided that he no longer gave a damn about anything other than sleeping and removing his conscious body from the world of horrors that he seemed to constantly find himself in, it was with a great weariness that he closed his eyes and submitted himself to whatever it was that would come next.


	2. Snape

His memory of finding the youngest Weasley boy bare arsed and dry heaving in the depths of the Slytherin dungeons was not a memory that Snape particularly wanted to spend his time dwelling on.

He had saved both Potter and Granger and had spoken to neither of them about what he had witnessed in doing so. He had witnessed the aftermath of the fucked up Weasley boy shortly after Draco had apparently left the boy. The Malfoy boy had raped the child hard enough to leave bruises on his thin hips, and likely bruises on his dignity and mind that no one but the redhead would ever perchance to see. No, the young redheaded boy was far too proud to admit to what had happened to anyone. Plus, the girl had done likewise; the aftermath of her debauchery had been loud and clear as well, but yet she had not told the boys that anything had actually happened between her and Draco.

Potter's case was entirely different though; they had witnessed his rape and his screams and his physical _enjoyment_ of the rough treatment of Lucius's mouth upon his sensibilities. This he had become aware of in a brief moment of rifling through Potter's memories, just following the expulsion of Lucius himself. Potter had been so undone by all that had occurred; he doubted that the boy had even noticed the pilfering of his mental mines.

….

The very next morning at breakfast, he had been interested in hearing of a strange rumor about a banshee shrieking throughout the castle in the middle of the night. Two students from his house had even asked if it were true! He had berated them for their gullibility and had continued onto his breakfast at the head table, set on retrieving the truth from the Headmaster, unobtrusively if at all possible.

It had been there that he had learned of the nightmare by Potter that had been violent enough to wake the entire dorm. Moreover, it was enough to notice the _sullenness_ of the Gryffindor table as it sat there across the hall in near silence, to realize that something was very aberrant with the situation regarding Dumbledore's favorite _pet_. It was almost enough to make Snape get up and click his heels together in front of the entire school, sans music; but he opted to restrain himself, not wanting to be the cause of any untimely wrought deaths at the sheer horror which would undoubtedly occur in response to his unseemly behavior.

It still brought a faint ghost of a smile to his lips that he had covered quickly with a sip of tea. It was a good thing too, because Dumbledore had chosen that very moment to glance at him from down the table. Snape had nodded curtly at him, not wanting to garner any unnecessary attention from anyone at such an early hour. It was apparent to him that Dumbledore had not bought his act, but he had not hoped for much more anyways and was not disappointed in the headmaster's response, or lack thereof.

He would never be anyone's favorite anything and he had long ago given up trying. That was one of the most important lessons he tried to impress upon his Slytherins; they had to learn to do things for themselves without the outright approval of others. Everyone immediately had assumed that he was evil for being sorted into Slytherin. He hadn't been at first, but after years of taking the brunt of others' prejudices, it had seemed almost common sense to accept the role and get the goods. No one would support them, and they were always the first to be blamed.

Thus, seeing the Gryffindors in such a state of disarray left something akin to a spring in his step as he set off for the rest of his morning routine.

….

Over the course of the next two days it had become obvious to him and the rest of the professors at Hogwarts that the Golden trio was suffering through some kind of extreme internal anguish. They sat at the far end of the Gryffindor table, barely eating or speaking, as they scanned the room around them with almost a vicious level of watchfulness.

"—had them in class?" He had heard someone ask McGonagall, as he shook himself out of his quiet study of the three bizarrely behaving second years.

"They are all three uncharacteristically quiet," she had responded, the worry evident in her quiet tone.

"Come now," he had snorted critically at her, "Granger has never been quiet for a minute of her life, let alone an entire class period."

He was unsurprised to see Minerva turn a flinty glare on him at the conclusion of his words.

"The same could be said for you, _Professor_ Snape," she had said in a much thicker Scottish brogue than usual.

"Touché," he had calmly nodded to her.

"Children," the headmaster had said then, breaking into what could only be laughingly described as a conversation.

"Have you tried to talk to them Minerva?" Dumbledore had asked then, returning to his common practice of ignoring him.

"No; short of assigning them detention, I cannot seem to get them alone." She had responded, sounding much calmer.

…

It was obvious enough to any fool that the Gryffindor trio were not themselves. He quickly shook his head, trying to rid himself of the memory of hearing Weasley boy's pitiful moans.

It had not been until later that he had given into his mind's need to further process all that he had witnessed after coming across the red haired boy lying half-conscious in one of the lesser used dungeon passageways.

In his memory, he thought disgustedly back to the scene he had walked in upon in his efforts to rescue Potter. The boy had nearly been on his tiptoes as he was forced to take each brutal invasion of Lucius's prick into his poor worn body. The look on his face had been palatable, as had his abject humiliation at being seen like that in front of his most hated professor.

And Lucius's hands, Merlin they had been holding the boy with fingers outstretched, seemingly mapping the contours of the crevices of his torso and groin as a blind man might. It was this image that had filled Snape with blinding fury, even now. He had been forced to witness other brutal rapes committed by Lucius, but had never thought to see something as hideous as the boy-who-lived under his slimy embrace.

It was a reminder to him that they were all so very fragile right now, including him.


	3. New Routines

The silencing spell had worked. They had slept the night through for the first time in more than 48 hours. Unfortunately, a full night's sleep was not enough to make up for the past three days of their lives. Moreover, as was evidenced by Ron and Harry's physical states the morning after, there was a definite price to be paid for the full night of sleep that they had acquired.

Ron had screamed himself hoarse; no doubt at least a partial result of having to watch Harry's repeated arse plundering by that ghoul Lucius – or so Harry thought. Harry, on the other hand, had scratched deep blood filled welts into the skin of his arms and legs and chest. Harry vaguely remembered a dream involving a shower and a potato peeler, but shuddered to try and remember any more about the cause of his unconsciously created claw marks.

While taking a careful piss in the lavatory that morning, he had passed by Ron at the sinks, watching his friend spitting out blood surreptitiously into the sink before gingerly brushing his teeth. He hadn't deigned to make note of his friend's actions, just as he hadn't shown his friend the extent of the scratches.

It was Thursday, and never before in all of his short time on earth had he wished so much for the arrival of the weekend and its blessed recovery time. They were all three behind on their homework, but only Hermione could still be bothered to care.

Although, Hermione's mental state was another point of worry causing contention. Harry and Ron had gotten to the common room first and were waiting on Hermione's arrival so that they could go to breakfast. Harry had been forced to shove all of his sheets down the laundry chute, after hastily—and carefully—throwing on his clothes and robes. He hoped that no one would see his sheets save the house elves, for he wasn't sure if he sit long enough to make it through his classes, let alone endure being lectured at by McGonagall or Pomfrey.

Finally though, Hermione had made it downstairs and they had gone down to eat.

"Oh Merlin," Harry said quietly after sitting gingerly down at their table. He pressed his hands against his eyes, under his glasses, his sleeves carefully buttoned against the livid and scratches that were now burning and causing little winces across the whole of his body.

Ron looked questioningly at him as Hermione spoke for the first time in two days.

"Double potions." She said in a monotone voice, as she stared at the tabletop, looking all the world as though Death had just danced across that very spot.

Ron's groan wasn't the only one heard at the Gryffindor table that day; Neville had added his voice as well, in a rare show of solidarity with the "Misplaced Three," as some had secretly begun referring to them as.

"Amen, mate," Harry had said wearily, nodding towards the round-faced boy. If anyone would understand abject terror and horror, it would be Neville.

It was obvious that the boy wanted to ask them a question, but they all three pointedly ignored him as they focused on putting some kind of fuel into their rundown bodies—well, at least Ron and Harry did. Hermione, for her part, sat huddled on the bench by herself, not touching anyone. The boys would have preferred to sit surrounding her, but they had felt that it was necessary for them each to keep an eye on what was before them, as well as _behind_ them.

She looked as though she were cold, even though the day was likely to be fairly warm, if the bright blue skies above them were any indication. Harry, conversely, felt as though he were burning up with the fire elicited from the hundred or so scratches littering the expanse of his body. Some of the scratches were still bleeding a bit; he could feel the blood from one dripping down his leg, into his shoe.

 _It didn't matter_ , he told himself firmly. Hermione would be the one facing her tormentor that day in class, not him. He wasn't watching Ron any more carefully than usually, otherwise he would have noticed the nearly green tint that his face had taken on at Hermione's mention of "Double Potions." He could still feel Draco's clammy hands on his body. In his dream from the night before, he had been on an ancient medieval stretching block, slowly being pulled apart as Draco had stood there, _touching_ him yet again, and breathing harshly in his ear.

Neither boy knew what, if any, dreams that Hermione had had, for she wasn't saying much of anything still. The trend continued that morning, through transfiguration. Hermione asked no questions and offered up no information. She sat there, stonily silent; Harry personally felt as though her gaze could potentially set smaller creatures on fire and was not certain if this were a good or a bad thing.

He could feel Professor McGonagall staring at her in concerned peculiarity, but otherwise made no motion towards her. The lesson of the day was to transform a goblet into a t-shirt, and this was where things became odd.

Ron's wand was still giving off sparks intermittently, but he no longer was swearing vocally at it. In fact, he wasn't doing much at all with anything. His head was propped up in his hands, and Harry assumed that Ron's increased lackadaisical behavior was likely due to his wand problems. Hermione, however, had a different game plan.

"Ron," she whispered after surreptitiously throwing up a lightweight silencing charm.

He jumped a bit in his chair and looked at her goggle-eyed.

"Ron," she repeated, still whispering, "trade wands with me."

Whatever they had been expecting her to say, _it wasn't that_.

"'Mione?" He blustered stupidly and hoarsely at her, looking at her closely as though his staring her down might somehow reveal the internal workings of her brain.

"Do it Ron." She said, more forcefully that time. "And then work on the assignment."

Without another word, they exchanged wands, and Harry raised an eyebrow at both of their expressions. He wasn't sure if McGonagall had watched that little interaction or not, but he quickly chose to drop the silencing spell to make sure they hadn't missed any more vital information.

The class apparently was having mixed success at their assignment, Harry soon surmised; some of the t-shirts were okay, minus the metal imprint of a goblet in the centre; while others were only the _size_ of a goblet. He poked his wand at his goblet, trying to focus on what _he_ wanted to make happen, and was pleasantly surprised for the first time in a week, when it actually happened. His had turned into a pajama shirt, complete with little goblets that steamed little "Z's" out their tops. Caught in the surprising moment, he actually let out a little snort of amusement which was quickly overshadowed by McGonagall's shout of approval.

"Well _done_ , Mr. Potter!" She exclaimed, a bit too jovially for his tastes. "Full points and ten points to Gryffindor for your creativity!" she said brightly to him, standing far too close for comfort. Unconsciously, he shrunk away from her and immediately looked for the position of her wand. Unbeknownst to him, the other two of the "Misplaced Trio," had responded likewise.

McGonagall, thinking that her sudden exclamation was to blame, took a step back, but did not lose the hearty grin she still had displayed on her face. She felt that it was time for him to outdo Ms. Granger in something for once. Surely that had been the reason for his reticence at her praise. _Surely_.

…

After that, class had passed rather slowly for Harry as he had watched Ron and Hermione carefully work with each other's wands. They had made no more comments to each other, and Harry wasn't sure if that was due to their individual levels of concentration or something else, deeper.

He couldn't actually see what it was exactly that Hermione was doing. She was bent over her goblet like a prisoner holding onto his or her food plate. It was almost as though she were deep in mental conversation with the goblet. He didn't dare interrupt her to ask for details though, but hoped that she would explain after class.

Ron, for his part, was behaving very skittishly. He couldn't seem to focus on the goblet as a whole; instead he seemed only able to transform a portion of the goblet one bit at a time. Thus far he had changed the mouth of the goblet into a slightly stretchy circle that Harry had assumed was the part where the head went through. He had done the same with the bottom of the goblet, but had somehow stretched it out into nearly four times the size of the top hole.

Every so often Harry caught McGonagall staring mystically at them, and as the practical part of the lesson waned onwards, he began to get a bit annoyed at her. There was obviously a problem with three of her students, not just three of her class students, but three students of her _house_. Why then was she just content to continue staring at them and not actually put forth any offers to help?

…

By the time that McGonagall had called time, he was fully pissed off at her callousness towards three of her own students. Why, even Snape watched out better for the students under his direct care.

 _Of course_ , Harry reasoned to himself that _that_ _was probably more because of his hatred of having secrets kept from him, especially right under his nose, than due to any real concern for his charges._

 _Still though, it seemed to him that had Snape been their head of house, Lucius would have never gotten his perverted hands on them, and certainly would have never, never . . . done anything else_ , he decided uneasily.

Trying to distract himself, he looked around at the class's results of the day. He saw more than a couple of brown t-shirts with gold looking trim, alongside some more disastrous attempts. Neville's goblet still retained its original goblet shape, but it no longer seemed able to hold up on its own power, and currently had fallen to the side in a great mushy heap that McGonagall had sniffed disdainfully at.

His shirt was without doubt the best of the day, he noted with more than a little surprise. Meanwhile, Ron's shirt looked just about right for, say, someone shaped like Barbie; its mid-section, while made out of cloth, was barely as big around as its collar. However, in direct opposition to that, its bust section looked large enough to fit someone like Aunt Marge.

Harry shuddered a bit, before looking at Hermione's goblet. He still couldn't believe that she had voluntarily switched wands with Ron, considering how much she valued her grades, and how little good Ron's wand had done since its fateful snapping when they careened violently into the Whomping Willow.

And yet, there she was, still hunched furtively over the goblet, his wand still in hand, her arms still covering her work.

"Ms. Granger, I do hope that you haven't fallen asleep over there," Professor McGonagall said, as she finally got around to checking Hermione's work. Harry winced with the iciness of their Professor's words and chanced a quick glance at Hermione, trying to gauge what her reaction—if any—would be at hearing one of her favorite professors speaking to her thus.

Harry, Ron, and the rest of the class sat tensely on the edges of their chairs as they waited for what surely would be a huge explosion of emotion from Hermione. McGonagall's words had sounded like something Professor Snape would say, and the man rarely failed to get an emotional response from her. Moreover, everyone knew that whatever had caused the Golden Trio's transformation into the Misplaced Trio had outwardly affected Hermione the worst.

Hermione though, had other plans, as was evidenced by the cool glare she used when she glanced up at their head of house.

"No _ma'am_ ," she said crisply at McGonagall. Harry thought that her gaze was almost sharp enough to go _through_ their professor and he silently winced, setting up a domino effect across his still injured flesh.

"Then let's see what you have," McGonagall said, obviously choosing to ignore the distasteful behavior of one of her best students.

And, miraculously, Hermione handed her a pale pink t-shirt that had been tucked under her arms for who knew how long. Ron gaped at her use of his wand to create something as adequate as that.

McGonagall unfurled Hermione's creation, and was rewarded by a harsh intake of breath from the rest of the class.

Written across a perfectly normal sized bust section, was a word in what looked like _steaming red ink_ ,which read "BITCH."

The class was shocked silent, and most were trying to figure out whether to stare in dismay at their completely flabbergasted professor, or to sneak glances at their now satisfied looking classmate.

McGonagall's mouth open and closed several times before she managed to speak a one word command that no one dared argue with.

" _ **DISMISSED**_ ," she said, glancing harshly at the rest of the class, obviously daring them to argue with her.


	4. Harry Takes a Little Trip

_What did she think they were? Nuts?_ Harry thought, as he grabbed his bag and waited on his friends. Ron was right there with him, but it was obvious to the both of them that Hermione could care less what happened next, as she slowly stood up after Professor McGonagall's roughly spat command.

 _Come on Hermione,_ Harry silently intoned to her within his mind. Sticking around after a display like that was akin to volunteering to stand still in front of a firing squad. It was a _bad_ idea.

"Ron," Hermione said, looking completely unruffled as though there was nothing wrong in their world, "do you mind if I borrow your wand for the rest of the day? I'll take care of it, I promise," she said, apparently oblivious to the absolutely idiocy of her statement regarding his nearly worthless wand.

"Sure," Ron whispered, swallowing painfully, his eyes excessively large in his too pale face.

"And you'll take care of mine as well, I understand," Hermione said, turning around to leave the classroom without waiting on his response.

They left as well, following quickly in her retreating footsteps. Harry was nothing short of amazed that Hermione had not gotten detention right then and there, as would have happened had anyone else tried something that blatantly disrespectful in class.

…

In fact, nothing happened until lunch was nearly over and they were getting ready to go be systematically embarrassed in Potions. More than a few students had made their way over to where they were sitting to congratulate Hermione on putting the "ol' bat" in her proper place. Fred and George had bounced around them in an annoying manner until Hermione had finally told them to go and made suggestions about where. She had actually shocked them into silence for all of about three seconds before they had simultaneously saluted her, snapped their heels together, and then joined arms and skipped out the main doors.

"You okay?" Ron had whispered painfully to her after they had left and the table had been rocked once more with its typical level of noisy complacency.

Hermione looked at him, narrowed her eyes, and deftly replied.

" _NO._ "

"That much I figured," Harry said quietly, his stomach too queasy to handle the idea of anything more calorie laden than pumpkin juice. With his early success in Transfiguration, he had been left with far too much thinking time, and the events of the previous weekend coupled with the throbbing lines under his clothes had turned him a bit ill and shaky. In addition, Hermione's behavior was further unbalancing his understanding of the world, and he was actually starting to consider going to the Infirmary; knowing that at least if he did that, perhaps he could be knocked unconscious and escape the current insanity of his world for a bit.

Then again, with the way Hermione was going now, she could just as easily knock him unconscious, and then that would save them all a trip. The fact that he was considering asking her to do just that was further worrying him, and the impending doom of going to double Potion's class was just adding to everything.

 _At this rate,_ he figured none too jokingly, _when I_ do _start hexing everyone, at least I'll be giggling._

The thought did not comfort him.

…

"10 points from Gryffindor, Mr. Weasley," Snape said, striding into the dank classroom that afternoon.

"Sir?" Ron had asked, coughing harshly after.

"For your _atrocious_ table manners just now in the Great Hall," Snape said, sneeringly at the thin red haired boy. The Slytherins tittered in appreciation of Snape's underhandedness towards one of Snape's most despised Gryffindor students. However, they also fell silent at his sudden glare towards them.

Snape's comments towards Ron served as just one more reminder to Harry about how he had spent his previous weekend, as he could not help but see Draco grinning leeringly at them. It actually made bile rise in his throat before he could push it out of his mind. He began sweating with a renewed fervor, even though the temperature in the room was icy at best.

He glanced over at Hermione, but was taken aback at the hideously cheerful grin she had plastered across her face. It was the kind of look that his cousin Dudley got whenever Uncle Vernon was doing anything especially foul to him. He knew that she must be planning something quite awful for Draco and was singularly glad that he was not in the shoes of the pale, blond-haired boy.

Having apparently decided that he'd done enough damage for the first section of the class, Snape turned around with a dark billow, and gestured at the board before barking out his orders to the class.

"Page 239 - Anti-hiccupping Solution; the instructions are in your book." He ground out in a sinisterly tone to the class of nervous second years.

The class knew better than to sit around after he had issued instructions.

"Individual work today," he added nastily. "Let's see how many of you can make it through today's class _without_ cheating," he said, glaring specifically at Neville, before dropping his eyes on Harry, and then turning to focus surprisingly on Crabbe and Goyle.

Harry had looked quickly at the ingredients list before making his way hastily—and gingerly—to the supply closet. Someone walked into him, landing an elbow in his side, causing him to hiss out loud at the pain. He looked to his left and was unsurprised to see a smirking Draco (he never could think of him simply as Malfoy after all that happened).

Draco ran his tongue over his lips before reaching for some lacewings on the shelf next to Harry's face.

"My my my, look at you," he said, silkily, caressing the front of his own ridiculously expensive robes, causing Harry to see the outline of his slimy cock hidden within the folds of cloth. Harry's stomach dropped lower, possibly into his shoes, where the trickle of blood had started dripping into again.

"Excuse me," he said pointedly, walking carefully back to his cauldron without dropping any of the ingredients. He was aware that Draco was still watching him, but he made a valiant effort not to show him that he had noticed.

…

Harry's Anti-Hiccupping Solution was the right colour and consistency, surprisingly enough. It seemed as though his luck from that morning had stayed with him, thankfully.

Well, it seemed like that until Snape quietly pointed out that he was dripping blood into his cauldron.

He looked up in confusion at his professor, not understanding why Snape would have the courtesy to help him, and not only that, but help him without the expected embarrassment he had grown used to in the time he had spent in his class.

"Squeeze some of the intestines from your flobberworms into the potion and stir counterclockwise for the next three minutes." Professor Snape said as he shielded Harry from the deprecating glances Draco kept fixing on him.

"Yes sir," Harry whispered and stretched his arm out to grasp the flobberworms. It was then that his side, where Draco had thrown a hard elbow into earlier that class period, decided that it had had enough and just wasn't going to hold together any longer. He felt his skin along his ribs tear open more completely than before, causing him to involuntarily hitch a gasp inwards.

Somewhere, along the way, his numb fingers dropped the flobberworm—on the floor thankfully, and not into the cauldron. He tried to hitch another breath, but the room had begun spinning around him, and he hunched in on himself, trying to hold his side unobtrusively with his arm clamped inwards. Without warning, he suddenly found himself remembering how Lucius had stood over him in a very similar manner, minutes before ripping the last shreds of dignity from him.

Tears clouded his eyes from the spinning room, and he found that he could not breathe.

"Potter!" Professor Snape rumbled disgustedly at him, as he reached out to catch hold of Harry's shoulders and prevent the stupid boy from dumping onto the floor, in broad sight of everyone.

Harry wheezed viciously, his instincts taking over fully as he felt the larger man's hands grasp his body.

Somewhere in the befuddled part of his thinking brain, he found himself endlessly repeating these words: _No! Not again!_

With his blood soaked shoes, he jerked himself backwards, knocking his head violently into the table behind him. As he sunk towards unconsciousness, Snape distinctly heard him say, "Oh good, I didn't need help."

 _How bizarre,_ Snape thought to himself, as he caught the pale, sweating, and now openly _bleeding_ boy-who-lived-only-to-be-fucked-senseless-by-a-nasty-death-eater.


	5. How Hermione Granger Received Detention

Severus Snape was loath to leave a classroom alone by itself, especially a classroom of 2nd year Gryffindors and Slytherins. Goodness knows that they got into enough trouble when he _was_ there. Unfortunately, the boy-who-lived-but-might-not-live-too-longer was passed out cold in his arms, and he really didn't have any better options.

Thinking quickly through his roster in regards to who he should leave in charge, he quickly pulled out a potentially formidable force and nodded to himself, finding that he had made his decision rather painlessly.

"Granger," he barked out to the girl sitting closest to them.

"Sir?" She turned coolly towards him, her eyes glinting somewhat unnaturally in the dim light of the dungeon classroom.

"You're in charge until I get back. Please try and keep anyone from dying until I return." He said, turning smartly on his heel and heading towards the door at a brisk pace. He was aware that leaving the girl in charge of a class that contained her abuser was not the brightest idea that he'd ever had, but there just weren't that many options available to him by that point. He knew that she was brave enough to face any problems head-on that would undoubtedly arise, and given her propensity for solving difficult problems, he was quite sure that she would handle them adequately, if not speedily.

Besides, it was a much smarter—not to mention safer—idea to leave her in the position of authority than one of those other dunderheads like Crabbe or Goyle. He shuddered lightly at the image of the destruction that would occur if they were to unexpectedly find themselves in charge.

He noticed with some discomfort that the boy did not look at all well as he hastily moved up the stairs towards the infirmary. It also worried him somewhat that the boy in his arms weighed less than he had when he had picked him up that previous weekend. He walked swiftly up the hallway and the subsequent stairs, shooting glares at anyone who bothered to look questioningly towards him or the boy in his arms.

Speaking of the boy in his arms, he was absolutely soaked through with sweat. Could he have been running a fever? The dungeons were not known for inducing sweat, although he and his classroom had caused such a reaction on more than one occasion.

He thought back to the class period in question. The boy had actually done surprisingly well, particularly in comparison with his usually abysmal results.

He shifted the boy in his arms, with the intent of getting a hand somewhat free in hopes of feeling the boy's forehead, but was brought up short by the sight of his blood covered hand. He looked uncomprehendingly at his hand and then made the connection, looking wonderingly at the shockingly pale boy in his arms. Truly, Potter's pale visage was even more startling than his own lackluster pallor. Idly and indiscreetly, as he walked down the last hallway leading towards Poppy's domain, he cast a warming charm over the cold clammy boy.

"Poppy!" He roughly called out, before he had even made his way fully into the main body of the Infirmary proper.

...

"Aw, did poor fwittle Potty hurt himself?" Draco said mockingly, as most of the other Slytherins joined in, laughing heartily at the fallen golden boy.

"Shut it," Seamus warned him, raising a fist menacingly towards the thin pale boy.

"Why don't you make me, you ridiculous excuse for an arse kisser," Draco said, narrowing his eyes and taking a step forwards.

"Aren't you going to stop them?" Ron turned and asked Hermione as he realized that the potential for a fight was seriously escalating. Ron was not particularly thrilled at the idea of Draco coming anywhere _near_ him, regardless of the reason.

"All he said was make sure no one dies until he gets back. So if you hurt Seamus, _Draco_ ," she said loudly, but in a hideously simpering sweet way, "I'll kick your arse so hard you'll be spitting out the dirt from the bottom of my shoes." She glared at him as the class gasped at her words.

"On the other hand," she said, appearing as though she were actually putting effort into thinking through the idea. "If Seamus hurts _you,_ Draco, my _darling butt kisser_ ," she said, not blinking at the onslaught of sudden glares she had from the Slytherin side of the room. "Then all I have to do is make sure you don't _die_ until your precious Professor Snape gets back. And then you can die and I won't be held responsible, because those were his words." She said, crossing her arms in a satisfied manner, and raising her eyebrow at Draco, as if to say, _what?_

Draco spluttered at her, apparently unaware of how stupid he had just been made to look. And that's when she threw in the exclamation point onto her argument.

"Oh, and Draco?" She asked coyly.

Given that he seemed incapable of anything resembling speech, she didn't wait for his answer.

"I just wanted you and the rest of the class to know-" she paused, turning to visually acknowledge everyone else who was waiting with wide eyes for what she was about to say to the prince of Slytherin.

"-that you have a really tiny dick." She finished, proudly watching the Slytherin's face turn from a pale pink into a bright burning red.

The rest of the class gasped a breath inward in amazement at the unseemly words of their class bookworm. For the Gryffindors, not only was this their second sudden gasp of the day, but it made it just that much more amazing that both out of character exclamations had been made by the same girl. Soon however, someone snorted, and shortly thereafter, the entire class, minus a specific few, was caught in wild runaway giggles.

Therefore, not many saw it when Draco drew his wand to try and cast a vicious spell against the mudblood who dared try to embarrass him in such a hideously public manner.

Unfortunately for him, Hermione _had_ been watching, and had been waiting for that very moment to release a spell of her own creation onto the sadistic boy who had taken her pride, in addition to peace of mind.

After Ron had found the silencing spell, she had continued thinking about the origins of that spell. In fact, her mind continued farther back into the reasons for childbirth to begin with, leaving her with images of lovemaking permeating her mind. Lovemaking was so far removed from the filth that Draco had forced on her. It just seemed right that she force some of Draco's own filth back upon himself.

Besides, the little bugger tried to cast Crucio on her! He had yelled it out towards her, forcing her to neatly sidestep it while silently throwing her own curse directly back at him.

_Morganocide!_

Simply put - penis death.

"Hmm, not the smartest idea you've ever had," she said, grinning maliciously at the boy who was now shrieking in an extremely high pitch upon the floor, while grasping futilely at his withering, and soon to be rotting, organ.

She was sure it must be a very painful experience, but she also found herself internally gleeful at the sight of his terror stricken squeals of pain. Furthermore, the use of Ron's semi-broken wand had allowed a greater level of power in casting spells; the trade-off of course being a lesser amount of control, but she was confident in her skills as she had proved in that morning's Transfiguration class.

"I suggest that we all take our seats and try to salvage our potions." She announced calmly to the class then. She noticed that all of the boys of the room were quickest to comply, while the girls moved with decidedly more dignity. As a whole, the class regarded her much more respectfully now that she had reduced the so-called prince of Slytherin down to nothing more than a wheezing, hissing bag of shit on the cold, dirty floor of the dungeons.

 _Hmm,_ she mused to herself, adding the final touches to her nearly complete potion, _if what they say about boys' brains being linked to their penis's, then this hissing, spitting state may be all that's left for Draco._

…

Severus Snape was disturbed.

After Poppy had gotten the boy's robes off, they had discovered that the white uniform shirt was nearly entirely soaked through with blood. Following that distressing discovery, she had closed the curtains and they had discovered that his body was crisscrossed in open and mostly still bleeding gouges of varying depths and degrees. His body was made nearly equally of open sores and skin; although, what skin was still present was swollen and feverish looking.

He'd seen healthier looking torture victims.

Hell, he'd _been_ a healthier looking torture victim.

When he'd found him with Lucius, the boy had looked bad, but nothing like this. The healing potion that he had provided would have taken care of the injuries following the use of the riding crop against his open flesh.

It had been four days since the attack against the boy. What could have happened in four days?

…

"How?" He had breathed in dismay at Poppy upon her removal of his school uniform.

Poppy looked at him with sadness etched deeply in the corners of her eyes and face, making him realize that that in all the time he had known her, she had never really looked her age—until now.

"Tell me," he had responded to her silent look of sadness.

When she had not answered, he had repeated his request, but more forcefully.

She tenderly lifted the boy into the air with her wand, so that they could look at his back. The scratches were still prolific, but for some reason they were nearly absent from the top middle of his back. With a soft motion, she set him gently back down upon the bed and looked back at him.

"He did this." He had said unbelievingly. The words tumbled out of his mouth as his brain strove desperately to catch up.

"He wouldn't have been able to reach that spot very well, the poor dear," Poppy had said, daintily wiping away a tear with a lace edged hanky.

And then, she had been all business again, setting to the boy's wounds with a renewed fervor of will and dedication to the life now in her care.

…

Now, having been securely kicked out of the hospital wing, he made his way back down into the darkness of his domain.

The initial sight of his room would normally have been a calming sight, but now, with what he had left behind him, finding his ex-prize student writhing in pain on the floor in a pool of his own blood-tinged vomit had somehow left him wanting.

He silently cursed the universe as he took large steps across to where Draco lay silently crying, his face tightly pinched with some kind of ongoing horrible pain.

Snape realized that he couldn't leave this boy on the floor in such a state; however, he had no desire to add Draco's vomit to Potter's blood which was now drying on his robes. Given the volatile state of the two boys when separate, he could hardly see the good in adding their ingredients together in such an instable format. Besides, while Draco might have been the son of a cruel foppish prick, he was still the _Slytherin_ son of a cruel foppish prick, and as such, he deserved better.

Thus, it was with little hesitation that he sent a Patronus message back to where he had just left in order to summon help.

…

It was not until after Poppy had left the room that he decided to find out the cause of this latest disturbance.

Maybe he would get lucky and the second years would kill each other off, leaving him with two extra free periods per week.

He sighed and glared around the room, as he realized that there were not enough leprechauns in the universe to allow him that kind of good fortune.

"Someone had better explain before I have Filch string the entire lot of you up by your toenails!" He growled viciously, sweeping from one side to the other as his eyes searched out for the guilty party.

But something was oddly off in the class. The students, both Gryffindors and Slytherins, were remarkably silent; in addition, they all seemed excessively intent on finishing the brewing of their pitiful potions, rather than paying attention to his ever increasing wrath.

This disturbed him.

"Longbottom!" He shouted in a voice normally guaranteed to cause the child to break into tears.

"Yes sir?" Longbottom asked, not looking away from his sludgy excuse for a potion. He was still a trifle fearful, but far too collected given the state of his excessively irate potions master.

"Who is the cause of the deplorable state of Mr. Malfoy and subsequently the putrid mess on the floor?" He shouted at the poor hapless boy in a way designed to make the boy piss his pants.

Longbottom barely twitched.

"I don't know sir. I was working on my potion." He replied nearly completely calmly, looking at his worthless bucket of slop as though it held all of the answers of the universe.

_What the hell was going on here?_

"Fifteen points from Gryffindor for blatantly lying to a professor," he ground out, before changing tactics.

"Zabini!" Snape called out, turning on his heel to stride over to that side of the increasingly icy classroom.

"Sir?" His student asked him, staring resolutely into his potion with the same level of determination present on his face that he had seen with Longbottom.

"Tell me the truth about who caused this _insanity_ ," he demanded, leaning in closely to the young Slytherin boy.

"The truth sir?" The boy asked carefully, still not looking up.

Snape considered his answer carefully. For Slytherins, asking for the truth was nearly laughable, considering how many varieties of truths one could find in any given situation.

"Yes _Zabini,_ " he said, making the boy's name sound like a curse, "I want your truthful account of everything that happened to Malfoy while I was out of the classroom."

"Yes sir. " Zabini speedily answered. "He got up from his desk, spoke insultingly about Potter, threatened Finnigan, wheezed, turned bright red, tried to use the Crucio curse on Granger, and then he fell down and started screaming, sir."

Snape actually felt the urge to roll his eyes at Zabini's one-sided account of what had happened to _Malfoy_. That is, at least until the words "Crucio curse" made it into the deeper levels of the grey matter of his brain.

"Did you say _Crucio Curse?_ " Snape asked the boy in a deep, rough whisper of disbelief.

"Yes sir," the boy answered smartly, still looking steadily in his cauldron.

Snape clenched his teeth together hard before turning back to the other side of the classroom to confront Granger.

"Granger," he said, standing dangerously close to her side, fully intending to threaten her non-verbally with just the proximity of his body.

"Sir?" She asked, and like the others, she spoke to him as though his head were in the cauldron instead of being part of the body that currently stood glowering over her.

"Malfoy cast the Crucio curse on you?" He asked in his very softest, most dangerous voice. It was the voice that had, on more than one occasion in the past, reduced grown death eaters to tears within moments of hearing the just the _sound_ of it.

Therefore he was a bit surprised to hear her answer in the negative to his question.

"Explain," he said, dropping his voice even quieter, so that no one could hear him except this damnable girl.

"He didn't cast it on me, because he missed me," she said, pausing and then adding, "sir," on to the end as an afterthought.

 _Ah_. That explained absolutely nothing about the situation.

"Would you say that you are responsible for his current deplorable state?" He asked, crouching farther down into her space.

She impressed him. She did not flinch, nor did she deign to look at him.

"It depends on your definition of 'responsible,' sir." She said, purposely ignoring the obvious danger she was currently working in.

Gods, how this child wreaked havoc upon his life!

He decided to let her know that she had wasted enough of his time with her idiotic defiance games.

"50 points from Gryffindor for irreparably disrupting the inner workings of my classroom, Ms. Granger; in addition, I shall see you tonight after dinner for the first of your month long _detentions_." He said briskly, standing up and making his way over the front of the classroom. He half expected to hear them gasp at his announcement of a month of detentions for her, but it seemed his lot in life to continually experience disappointment.

"Moreover, I expect 2 feet on what happened in today's class while I was otherwise occupied outside its room. This will be due next week. _Furthermore,"_ he said with exaggerated emphasis, "anyone who depicts Granger as the guilty party will earn 10 points towards their affiliated house, regardless of whether they are Slytherin _or_ Gryffindor."

 _There, that ought to shock them_.

"Ms. Granger," he said, turning and glaring at her still bowed head, "you will stay after class to clean up the mess that Malfoy made, as well as your classmate's potions. As for everyone else," he said, pausing and then dropping his voice a full octave, "you are to get the hell out!" He growled, in an effort at unleashing some of his bottled up fury over that afternoon's less that successful turn of events.

He got a reaction that time. Everyone grabbed their stuff and with nary a glance backwards, took off out of the classroom.

It wasn't until they were all gone that he opted to stare down at the girl who had caused the beginnings of an epic headache in his lower right temple. Unfortunately, the headache only got worse when she looked at him and fixed him with a glare of her own.

 _Merlin, he needed a drink_.


	6. Ron Makes A Mistake

Ron sat by miserably by himself at the end of the Gryffindor table, amidst a wildly talkative room of students. Hermione had done something that few other students had ever succeeded at; not only had she bested Professor Snape, but she had gained control of the classroom as well, all with the aid of just one well-placed curse.

Ron knew that it was a curse and that it had involved doing something very painful to Malfoy's genitals. Given what he had done to them that previous weekend, Ron hadn't been surprised at the level of the viciousness she had used in her retaliation upon the arsehole. Draco was damned lucky he hadn't lost his life in that exchange.

 _I would have killed him, if I could have figured out how_. He thought bitterly to himself, his stomach clenching against his will.

He had also been shocked at the level of compliance that the boys had exhibited following Draco's downfall.

 _If Snape had questioned any of the girls other than Hermione, he would have gotten his answers much quicker,_ Ron thought glumly to himself as he barely picked at his food. It was very rare for him to lose his appetite, but after a class with the creature who had—Merlin, he couldn't even think the word in his head.

He closed his eyes and seriously considered skiving off the rest of the week in favor of just going to sleep until Monday. He was dangerously close to drifting off into his mashed potatoes when someone grabbed his shoulders.

Without thinking—he probably wasn't capable of rational thought by this point—he drove his elbow hard into the figure behind him, before freeing himself and jumping away from his apparent attacker. He had Hermione's wand in his hand without thinking, and was still nervously backing away in the sudden silence that had developed since accidently attacking his head of house.

 _Merlin!_ He had just attacked his head of house. McGonagall was being helped up by several frazzled looking students when he decided that he had seen enough and started running desperately for the doors to the Great Hall. He barely slipped through them before they clanged shut, apparently on orders from Dumbledore. After all, whom else would the castle listen to as readily?

He had to get out of the castle. He had to. He _had_ to.

…

"Professor McGonagall?" several students asked at once following her forcible fall to the floor. "Are you okay?"

She had waved them off, before turning to witness the youngest Weasley boy's escape from the Great Hall. Upon seeing—and hearing—the clang of the doors, she abruptly realized that Dumbledore was now involved and had taken matters into his own hands, as it were.

 _Blast the old man_.

It was obvious to her that something had badly frightened the trio of second year Gryffindors over the course of the previous weekend. Now she had acted stupidly by coming up behind the solitary boy and scaring him into pure fight or flight mode.

Dumbledore had further complicated the developing situation by making an apparent forceful grab for the boy's person, by use of his connection with the castle itself.

Merlin only knew when they would find the boy now. She sighed inwardly, and then turned to go speak with Dumbledore, promising herself a stiff drink at the end of it all.

…

He got outside of the castle somehow, still in full panic mode, and continued running full out for the darkness that lay before him. It didn't matter where he was or where he was going; all he knew was that he could no longer stay there, in a place where the creature who had hurt him could be anywhere, at anytime. He knew that if the younger Malfoy found him, he might not manage to escape with his poor pitiful excuse for a life this time.

He fell, once and then twice, and then once more; the last time he fell resulted in him tumbling down a short hill, rolling head over feet in a rough mindless panic before finally landing at the bottom. He wheezed painfully by himself in the plush itchy grass, as he tried to get a hold over his wild untamed fear that was currently rushing madly through his body.

He took a breath and held it and then let it out, clapping his bruised and scraped hands over his mouth as he heard a wildly hysterical giggle pass through his lips. He was crying by the time he forced himself to stand, and bit down on a groan as he realized that he had twisted his right ankle in one of the three falls he had had since his wild exit from the castle.

He gripped his head and squeezed it, trying to mold his brain back together with just the strength of his frazzled will. Suddenly paranoid, he held his breath and listened to the darkness that was behind him. He heard nothing, but was still unwilling to use Hermione's wand to light a lumos. Wait, did he even still have her wand?

He reached into his pockets and pulled out the miraculously intact wand, before shoving it back down where it had been and taking off in the direction of where he thought Hagrid's house sat. Hell, maybe he could wander into the Forbidden Forest and be accidently killed by a centaur. That would really fit well into his life of late.

He giggled breathlessly to himself, still walking briskly in the near blinding darkness—it was cloudy that night—but moving onwards with infinitely more care this time.

…

As he walked, a terrifyingly horrible thought came to him and he fought against it for another few steps before the strength of his fear brought him crashing down to his knees. He held his stomach as he moaned piteously against the grass carpet under him.

_What if Malfoy is out here wandering in the dark, same as me? What if I were to take another step forwards only to feel Draco's clammy dead feeling fingers latch onto my neck?_

They wouldn't stay there, he knew. They would trail downwards, back under his robes to thrust themselves into his pants and –he choked against the fist that he had unknowingly wedged in his mouth.

What the hell was wrong with him? Harry had been brutalized by that man and he was fine compared to him. And Hermione, gods she was strong. She had managed to intimidate an already terrorized class and had practically forced them to switch loyalties over to her entirely.

And what kind of friend was he then; lying in the cold grass, his fist wedged so tightly in his mouth that he had begun tasting blood, afraid to take another step for fear of phantom hands. Merlin, he was pathetic. It didn't seem to matter though; he could not convince himself to get up and go out back out into the dark on his own.

A flashback overtook him then, and he was forced to relive the feel of Draco's cock as it forced its way inside of his unwilling body. And Draco's hands, his hands had pulled Ron's body back into the soft folds of his body, against his vile and _warm_ flesh. How could he have taken note of such a hideous thing?

But the worst part was after Draco had come and pulled out, leaving a warm trickle of cum down the backside of his thigh. Draco had reached forwards and given his partially _hard_ cock a brief and gentle caress, before putting himself to rights. Had Draco been proud of him? Or just admiring his cock? Or was he just being creepy?

He remembered that the boy had whispered to him softly and sibilantly the entire time. The sound of his voice over the backside of his shoulder had made his skin itch at the things the other boy had said.

" _I can tell that you are enjoying having my dick up your pussy_." He had told him, more than once, but in different ways.

" _I don't think you really are a virgin. You're far too good at milking me with your tight cunt, you fucking piece of arse."_

It had only gone downhill from there. The other boy had only stopped talking when he was biting or licking his backside with increasingly possessive sounds coming out of his throat, the more turned on he became. And Ron had just lay there and had been forced to take the ragged pain of being invaded and _owned_ by the harshly panting sadistic perversion of a boy who had been standing proudly over him.

He could almost feel the cooling warmth of Draco's cum against his legs once more and he unconsciously let loose a long pained moan. Although he wasn't personally aware of it, in his fear he had lost control of his bowels, which was why he currently felt dampness pressing against his skin.

He was a crossroads of his existence. On one hand, he desperately wanted the protection of his family against the terrors that had railed against him; however, on the opposite side of that, he was terrified of hearing their reactions to what had happened to him in that hallway under the ministrations of Draco's long heated tongue.

He'd gotten _hard_ at Draco's fucking touch!

He muffled another sob against his fist. Like Harry, Ron was too young to understand about autonomic physical responses. Had he talked to Hermione about what kinds of thoughts he was having, she could have explained it in a heartbeat; unfortunately though, she was in detention with Snape, Harry was in the infirmary, and he was out there by himself, alone.

He sobbed miserably to himself out in the darkness by himself, as he desperately tried to banish the cruel memories from his cortex. Alas, they were not to be gotten rid of quite as easily as all of that.

So he bit down on his hand once more and jerked as he felt his teeth touch some hidden pressure point that sent pain wailing through his entire arm. He cried out again, but did not feel shame for his weakness; rather, he felt justified for the punishment he was receiving.

…

After the class had left his Potions classroom, Snape remained standing in the same place as he continued to glare at the student who wreaked such havoc in such a short time upon his life therein.

"I am most displeased by the turn of events this afternoon," he snarled out at the girl whom he had comforted less than a week ago.

"Really." She stated calmly, looking at him as though he were just a fly on the wall.

"YES!" He growled towards her, taking several steps towards her smaller figure. He was therefore quite unprepared for what happened next.

She got up— _without his permission_ —and took several defiant steps towards his towering form.

"You will sit back down _now_ ," he growled harshly at her, his eyes lighting up dangerously. Any other student would have run backwards at the look on his face alone, but as she was quickly proving to him and the others who had been around her in classes that day, she was not just _any_ student.

"How do you think it felt to walk in here and find Draco Malfoy just sitting there, licking his chops at me and pulling on his crotch?" She demanded from him shrilly and angrily.

"The matter was fully in my control!" He bit out just as angrily towards her, shoving a finger into the middle of his chest.

"Your fucking control is a joke to Slytherins!" She hysterically spat at him.

"20 points from Gryffindor for cursing at a professor," he said icily, trying to regain some kind of control over the situation.

"Fuck your points!" She said, throwing herself at him to beat her small fists against his lean torso.

And suddenly just like that, the anger in the room dissipated, and he swiftly discovered that he had a young girl sobbing her heart out against the front of his robes.

He looked down, somewhat discomforted by the turn of events in the past ten minutes. Her hands were now fisted in his robes, as though she were hanging onto him for life, as though he was some kind of ugly excuse for a life vest.

"Ms. Granger?" He asked in what he was hoping came across as a gentle voice.

But she did not answer him, and continued sobbing desperately against him. Her cries were not just tears of frustration and anger, but rather they were tears of loss, tears of misery over what had transpired to make her break off from the person she had been.

Snape carefully backed up towards his desk, half-carrying, half-pulling the young and wildly distraught girl with him, until he had reached his desk. Once there, he sat down upon its surface, and with only a moment's hesitation, bent over and pulled the girl up, so that she was resting sideways on his lap, her head on his shoulder. From there, he reached his arms around her and brought her in close next to his chest, feeling the tremors of her body continuing to move through her lithe young form.

And so they sat, completely silent save the sounds of her tapering off sobs.

…

Harry moaned as he began swimming back towards consciousness. He ached everywhere, inside and out, and personally wondered why the powers that be had thought it necessary for him to _ever_ regain consciousness. The inky blackness surrounding his body and mind had been so very nice.

"There now," he heard Pomfrey's indistinct voice clucking beside him. "That's the way."

Regretfully, he opened his eyes to see her face bobbing next to him blurrily. Half-blindly, he reached for his glasses, only to have them pressed carefully into his hands.

After shoving them on his face, and realizing that Pomfrey was the only one in the near vicinity, he took an unobtrusive breath of relief.

"I haven't told the headmaster, or Professor McGonagall," Pomfrey said, seemingly reading his unvoiced thoughts.

"But Snape?" He croaked out at her, his throat very dry.

She poured and handed him a glass of water before answering.

He slowly drank it gratefully. In addition to clearing out the taste in his mouth and throat, its simple coolness seemed to help clear the leftover cobwebs in his brain. Then he abruptly jumped as though someone had just slapped him, suddenly remembering the initial reason for passing out in the first place.

He reached delicately to the back of his head and felt a tender spot that no doubt had been a wide open gash mere— _hours?_ —before.

"What day is it?" He asked uncertainly, putting his previous question on hold for a moment.

"It's still Thursday," she answered calmly and matter-of-factly.

"So, Snape?" He responded, feeling the need to prompt her into explaining that decidedly odd turn of events.

" _Professor_ Snape," she said, emphasizing the word with a sharp look at him, "carried you down here himself."

He goggled openly with surprise at her. Madam Pomfrey was no fool; she knew, perhaps better than most— _Dumbledore,_ he thought ruefully—how little he and the Hogwart's Potion master got along.

"I suppose he waited until after class?" He asked fearfully, but resignedly willing to accept the truth.

"No, Mr. Potter, he did _not_." She said, putting her hands on her hips and straightening her already impeccable posture to an obviously annoyed level of ramrod stiffness.

"He brought you in _immediately_ after the incident in question, and then did not leave until he was certain of your prognosis," she continued, sniffing daintily at him and his audacity.

He blinked owlishly at her before daring to peer under the standard hospital issued pajamas he was wearing.

"You are _mostly_ healed," she clucked exasperatedly at him. "But you would be _completely_ healed if you had come in directly after acquiring _them_ ," she said angrily, though her anger was not directed at him.

"As it is," she crossed her arms in front of her, "you will have to spend the night."

He looked up in terror at her calmly stated matter-of-fact words.

"I feel all right ma'am," he said meekly, afraid of what might happen if he were to sleep in front of the dragon lady after the events of the past week. "Honest," he added with less than a truthful look on his still pale face.

"Nonsense!" She huffed at him. "You are the patient, and as such, you have no right to be making decisions about your health while in _my_ care." She said, glaring reproachfully at him. " _Especially_ ," she added, raising her eyebrows, "when your previous decisions about your own health have been so very poor!"

He winced at her words and shrunk back from her fury as though she were about to hit him.

Instantly, she felt her anger dissipate as she saw her charge reduce down to the cowering figure before her.

"Sorry ma'am," he was mumbling, looking resolutely down at his trembling fingers, before balling them up and thrusting them under the sheets. "Sorry sorry sorry," he rambled on, still somehow managing to shrink further into himself and the pillows behind him.

"Don't worry about it dear," she said gently, slowly laying an arm on the bedcovers beside him. She felt her gut twist as he continued to move his lips soundlessly, still staring downwards tensely, as though he expected to be struck at any moment.

"You are not in trouble," she said, still speaking gently and calmly, in an effort to bring him back from whatever place he had automatically switched into at hearing her angry tone of voice directed at him.

She saw him quickly glance up at her from behind his bangs, before resuming the same pose.

"Harry," she said, feeling the overwhelming need to put the poor child at ease, "I _want_ you to feel safe here. You should know," she said, smiling a bit up at him, "I can keep secrets even better than the headmaster."

He glanced up at her and this time continued to hold her gaze.

Emboldened by his response, she continued on with her request.

"If there's ever anything you need to tell me about," she said, moving her hand to his too thin shoulder and feeling it tense for a moment before relaxing, "you _can_ without worry of reprisal or punishment." She patted him on the shoulder for her own comfort, as much as his. "This I can promise you with the whole of my being," she said resolutely, finally taking her hand away.

Harry was dumbfounded, to say the least, at her turnaround in mood. For a few moments there, he had felt as though he were back at his uncle's house, about to be roughly thrown into his cupboard.

He blinked and automatically tensed when she laid her hand on his shoulder, but soon relaxed as he realized that her touch did not hurt.

 _Maybe it's a girl thing,_ he thought to himself. _But then, that theory didn't explain Aunt Petunia very well, now did it._

He could see that she meant the words that she was saying, but as Uncle Vernon had demonstrated, and then Lucius Malfoy had reemphasized, words meant absolutely nothing in the grand scheme of things. It was obvious enough to him that she _thought_ she would be able to stand by her words of promise, but that didn't mean that when the shit hit the fan, she would actually continue to hold up her side of the bargain.

And yet, the idea of trusting someone, while complete aberrant to his way of thought, was also strangely enticing. To think, he could put all of his troubles in someone else's hands and trust them to do right by _him_ ; that was truly a heady thought, as well as a pleasant image to have pass through his mind. Unfortunately, an image was all it was; no one had ever done right by him, and he had the scars—mental and physical—to show for it. After all, look what he had gotten for trusting Lucius Malfoy's fucking word! Hermione and Ron had been given over to his lying, cheating, sack of shit son!

 _No_ , he thought angrily, his eyes tearing up slightly as the emotions bubbled uncontrollably through his chest; _trust was something best left to those who just don't know any better._ He bit his lip as he fought to regain control over himself.

Beside his bed, Madam Pomfrey sighed quietly to herself as she watched the boy's face flit between emotional extremes before he resolutely clamped down on his bottom lip and stilled himself. Somewhere in his past, the boy had learned to fend for himself against a world whose purpose seemed only out to hurt him.

She feared that Minerva had been right about the Muggles he had been sent to live with as a wee little one.

Sensing that their conversation was done with, she went ahead and told him that she wanted his cooperation for the remaining time he was to spend there. Moreover, she wanted him to eat a good dinner and then shortly thereafter take some dreamless sleep to ensure his rest.

Surprisingly, he did not argue with her on any of her demands. She sighed quietly once more before getting his supper; the least that she could do for Lily's son was to make sure he went to sleep with his belly full and his immediate needs met. After that, it was anyone's guess.

…

"How can you stand to touch me?" Hermione asked him quietly after her sobs had quieted somewhat.

"Pardon?" Snape asked, somewhat befuddled by the question she had sprung on him in the midst of one of the stranger evenings of his life. There he sat on the edge of his desk, Ms. Granger's head seemingly welded to the front of his—damp—robes, while his own arms were draped protectively around her back. It was a potentially odd situation for anyone, really, given Granger's generally resolute nature.

"How can you stand to touch me?" She asked, repeating her previous inquiry. "I'm so disgusting and dirty." She continued before pressing her face more firmly into the crook of his shoulder.

He could feel her body trembling as she waited for his reply.

 _Now would be a really good time not to eff things up, Severus,_ he thought determinedly to himself, as he looked down at the petite feminine form in his lap.

"Draco is the one who is filthy, dear child," he said in a surprisingly gentle voice. "His actions against you didn't transfer that inherent slime to you." He said, lifting her damp cheek off of his chest, so that she would be forced to look into his eyes and see the truth there.

"He hurt me," she whispered simply, sounding to him like a much younger child. She spoke her truth plaintively, steadily looking up at him even though he had removed his fingers from her milk-white cheek.

"You are infinitely correct, and I _am_ very regretful over the sadistic actions he performed against you." As he spoke, his eyes narrowed dangerously, as he venomously railed against the pain that the _boy_ had caused the innocent creature in his arms.

"And yet, I am no _child_ ," she said, speaking with a bitterness he had not been expecting. "He took _that_ , and he didn't even give a _damn_ about it. He just laughed and—and-," she gasped, breaking off as sobs ricocheted through her thin body once more.

"Child," he said sadly. He kissed her gently on her forehead, just the way that he had done after speaking with her the following weekend.

She surprised him once again when she reached out a shaking finger and traced the tip over his lips.

"You stopped there last time, but then, like this time, you could have continued." She said, looking inquisitively up at him. "Why did you stop?" She asked, seemingly unaware of the reaction his body was having in response to her simple question.

"You are much too young and far too vulnerable for such a thing." He said sternly. "No one should have to endure just an experience, yet people, _males_ and females are forced to do so every day." He said, looking at her carefully.

"I would be no better than a monster like _them_ if I had done, or ever _did,_ such a thing as you have requested." He knew that he did not have to explain what he had meant by _them_.

"I just want to feel safe again," she said, her voice breaking a bit at voicing her fear to a man not known for his kindness or his tenderness towards the feelings of others.

He nodded. He knew all too well what it was like to feel in such a way. But no, he would not allow himself to dwell on his dismal past.

"You should straighten your robes and leave." He said formally to her, but not harshly.

She nodded obediently, understanding that his dismissal was not against her.

"Get," he said, though not unkindly, and pointed at the door with his wand as he removed the privacy wards that he had quietly cast earlier.

"Sir, what about the classroom?" She said, demonstrating at the mess that was still left from the end of that day's disastrous class.

Looking around, he muttered something unintelligible, and simultaneously waved his wand. She watched in amazement as he instantly vanished away the entire mess before her eyes.

"I wish I could do that," she said, her eyes bright with usefulness of the magic he had just used.

"I will teach you," he stated calmly to her, pleased to note her newly grinning countenance at his words.

"Oh would you sir!" She said, feeling her joy bubbling over at his offer.

"Yes," he said smirking, "but only if you leave now." This he said to her with an upturned eyebrow. "And only," he said, adding another condition, "if you leave in a proper manner."

"Tired and weary?" She brightly quipped.

"Very," he said, schooling his features into the stern and dark professor once more.

"Yes sir," she answered, trying to sound meek.

She got another upturned eyebrow for her tone of voice.

"That will do for tonight Granger," he said, sounding weary as well, as though the chore of dealing with wayward Gryffindors had slowly sapped every ounce of his energy for the day.


	7. Snape is Amused

Following Ms. Granger's exit from his classroom, Severus Snape slumped in relief, quickly warding the door once more, before turning and walking towards the blank wall behind his desk.

He quickly touched three seemingly arbitrary spots on the wall and drew a triangle between them, delicately using the tip of his wand.

"Neva Sophia," he whispered, pressing his palm against the cold stone before him. Abruptly a doorway appeared, and shortly thereafter, a hallway. He quickly strode down the hallway to his quarters, throwing a glance over his shoulder to assure himself that the doorway really had closed behind him.

 _Just like it does every night,_ he thought, slightly annoyed at himself for his need to constantly recheck everything around him.

Quickly he dropped his robes on the couch, and went to his bed.

…

By the time Hagrid found Ron, the boy was catatonic with fear from the perceived images his mind had been shoving at him relentlessly since falling that last time.

Hagrid had been warned by Professor McGonagall that the youngest Weasley boy was out there somewhere and that they needed to find him before something more dangerous did. Hagrid took his duties very seriously and therefore was very relieved to find Ron still physically intact, albeit a little nonresponsive.

"Ach, poor lad," he said quietly to Fang on their way to the castle.

"He's done gon' and wet hi' self. Musta b'n scared b'sumtin out here on his own. Poor lad." He said, shaking his head woefully at the boy who was dwarfed by Hagrid's mighty arms.

Inside, Ron was accompanied to the infirmary by Professor McGonagall herself, with the help of Hagrid. She did not feel the need to inform the headmaster, knowing that it was likely enough that he already knew. The old man and his foolish ways had been responsible for more than one mess in her time there.

 _Harry Potter for one_ , came to her mind unbidden. She pushed the thought away grimly, as she prepared herself for dealing with the problem at hand. She was, therefore, somewhat surprised to see Harry already in the infirmary waiting on them.

 _No, wait_ , her brain corrected itself.

The boy wasn't waiting on them—he was simply a patient there that day as well.

_Again?_

After all, his eyes were closed, weren't they? She narrowed her eyes, peering closely at him from across the room, trying to appear as though she were simply trying to see the calendar on the far wall when Poppy bustled into the room.

"Oh you know you can't get anything past _me_ , Minerva!" Poppy said, instantly seeing through her ruse.

"I was about to come and look for you," she said sternly, trying to cover up her dislike of having two of her Gryffindors in the infirmary at one time.

"Hagrid found the youngest Weasley boy in the darkness outside the castle, curled into a ball and wide-eyed with terror, just as he is still." She said, indicating the boy with her hands to the stern head of the infirmary.

"Oh my," Poppy said; gasping a sharp breath inwards at the sight of the prone figure. "Hagrid, put him on this bed, would you dear?" She waved him onto the nearest bed and then turned back to McGonagall.

"Minerva, would you be so kind as to fetch Severus for me?" Poppy asked her, mid-bustle.

McGonagall watched on silently for a moment as Poppy removed Ron's clothes with a flick of her wand and started running diagnostics, before snapping herself out of her lethargic state and acquiescing to the woman's request.

She left the infirmary, striding quickly towards the dungeons, while Poppy shot Hagrid a pointed glance.

"W'll, I'll jus' be on me wa'," Hagrid said, nodding vigorously as he slowly got the hint, whistling to Fang to join him as he left the infirmary.

Poppy sighed as she watched the large head leave. With adults and professors like these, it was no wonder she constantly had students filling her beds.

…

Shortly after, Severus found himself stepping out of the floo into Poppy's domain for the third consecutive time that day. Minerva had sent him on to the infirmary while muttering something about a "hard drink," when he had asked her if she was coming through as well.

One reason he enjoyed Poppy's company was her common sense. This was apparent when she noticed Minerva's absence, and simply took it in stride.

He walked straight over to the Weasley boy's bed, noting the pale flesh that was peeking out around the hospital issue pajamas he was now wearing. He swallowed his fury towards the Malfoys before crouching down to look at the boy directly in the eyes.

"What do you think Severus?" Poppy said quietly from behind him.

He stood up, feeling his joints creak a bit with weariness. After all, his day had been inordinately long.

"Well, he is _not_ petrified," Snape answered knowledgably.

"I thought as much." She said, moving next to his side somberly.

"I had him in class earlier." Snape admitted.

"And?" She turned and peered up at him.

"He was a bit quiet, but otherwise seemed perfectly-," he paused, looking for the right word, " _himself_." He said.

"Do you have any of your double-strength calming potion on hand, Severus?" She asked him, her face looking down at the boy once more.

He rummaged in his pockets for a moment before catching a hold of the vial he was looking for. He pulled it free and looked at the silvery concoction in its individual glass vial triumphantly.

"I had better just spell it into his stomach," Poppy said with a sigh. "I want you to be on hand, of course, Severus dear." She said, patting his arm absentmindedly.

 _Dear?_ He thought; his reaction caught somewhere between amused and exasperated. She hadn't called him that since he was a student under her care.

_Then again, today has probably been an inexplicably odd day for her as well, given the three cases that I alone have had a hand in._

"I think I'll just stand back a bit, out of the way," he suggested evenly to her as she was preparing to supply the boy with the proper dosage.

"I suppose your image is not the most calming," Poppy said, sniffing back a sound that sounded to Severus's sharp ears more akin to a laugh than anything dealing with the nasal cavities.

"It must be catching," he said with a rare level of wryness.

"What?" She asked absent-mindedly.

"Sounding like the headmaster." He said cheekily, smirking a bit at her back. He dropped the smirk when she turned to look at him coolly, but even grinned a bit after she walked past him and _inadvertently_ shoved an elbow into his gut.

"Oops," he said, giving her a faux-serious look.

"Oh shut it you." She huffed at him and then nodded to the back of her domain. "I've got two sleeping students back there, one of which is _yours_ ," she said, getting back to business completely.

"Why don't you drop in on him while waiting to see if this works?" She said, making it an order, rather than a suggestion.

He grimaced a bit and then nodded his agreement to her, all traces of amusement gone from his countenance. When he was almost all of the way back to where Draco Malfoy lay, he heard her mutter something under her breath.

"Oops indeed, Mr. Snape."


	8. Harry's Waking Nightmare Gets Invaded

Despite Madam Pomfrey's use of the Dreamless Sleep potion on him, Harry still managed to wake on his own at only half past three the next morning. It was still dark, and his bed was still comfortable, but he no longer felt safe in his own mind. Furthermore, he knew that if he used their spell, Madam Pomfrey would know faster than he could say bedpan.

 _Oh well, it was nice while it lasted_. He thought morosely to himself. He was reaching for his glasses when he heard a sound that made him freeze in his tracks. Slowly, he pulled his arm back under the covers and closed his eyes to just tiny slits.

He felt his body shaking almost imperceptibly under the covers and silently pleaded for help from someone— _anyone_.

"These are not the standard visiting hours," Madam Pomfrey's whispered voice shook with fury towards whomever she was speaking with.

"I'm here to see my _son_ ," the man's silky smooth voice replied. It was just as quiet as Pomfrey's voice, but the tone implied great danger if she dared disobey.

Next to the bed across the way from Harry lay, a quiet figure stood and made its way over to the confrontation at the front of the room. Before passing free of the curtains that protected their beds from outside eyes, the dark figure looked directly at Harry and pressed a single long finger to its lips.

 _Shh_ , was the obvious silent order.

Harry creaked his neck up and down awkwardly, and then didn't move again as he saw the figure step out into the pale light of what must have been Pomfrey's lit wand.

It was Snape. The shock of this revelation went through him, straight down the tips of his toes, before Harry remembered how to breathe again.

"You're not welcome here Lucius," Snape said, speaking in a voice far colder and harder than any that Harry had ever heard him use with students, no matter how angry they had made him.

"Ah Severus," Lucius's voice said, freezing Harry's insides painfully cold. "My old friend has joined us at last," Lucius said, snorting with mirthless hate.

"What?" Snape said, obviously mocking the other man, "Did you not hear Madam Pomfrey asking you to leave? Getting hard of hearing in your old age?" He asked bitingly.

"You would do well to stay out of this _Severus_ ," Lucius spoke, all fake tidings of politeness now gone from his cold tone. Harry felt the sound begin to wrap around his neck, like a boa constrictor might do to its prey. Logically he knew that there was nothing around his neck, but logic no longer seemed to matter; he wasn't getting enough air and that was simply that.

He heard someone moving towards the back of the infirmary, and tried to do as Snape had instructed and stay silent, but short of holding his breath, there wasn't much of any way to cut off the sound of his now labored breathing.

Lucius was standing much closer now; his voice was louder and more insistent.

Harry could feel Lucius's hands on him, touching him _everywhere_. The fear of that day was sinking into the cold from the sound of Lucius's voice in the center of his body; he felt as though it would drag him clean into the mattress itself. He covered his mouth with the blanket and breathed and quietly and as quickly as he could, more and more certain that the next breath would be his last.

"I _am_ going to see my son, you reprehensible bag of potion slop!" Lucius said, throwing himself bodily into Snape.

From his vantage point, Harry could see very little, especially given that his vision was starting to be tinged with red and hazy black dots. However, upon hearing a couple of differently sounding loud grunts, it soon became apparent that each man had painfully struck the other in some manner or form.

And then suddenly he heard Pomfrey's voice above the chaos of the room.

"Stupefy!" She said, very calmly and collectedly. Instantly, one of the men dropped to the floor and silence once again reigned in the room.

For a bit anyways.

That's when Harry pulled his face out of the blankets and flung his head back against the pillow, gasping mightily.

"I've got him," he heard what sounded like Snape's voice say. "You bind Lucius. I sure your knitting skills are better than mine."

Harry heard mismatched steps come up to his bedside and he realized that Snape was limping from whatever Lucius had hit him with.

Blurrily, he saw Snape raise his wand and mutter something above Harry, before stepping back and watching him calmly.

Harry felt the effects of whatever Snape had cast on him immediately, as he felt the weight lift from his chest to be replaced by what felt like endless shudders of fear and shame, mixed in great dollops together in his stomach.

He could breathe, but not without crying—which is what he was doing in great big wailing breaths. Goodness, he hadn't cried like this in years, if then. Indeed, the more he tried to gather his control over the wild waves of emotions tearing through him, the worse they got. Frankly, he thought it was likely that he would soon shudder himself off the bed and into a massive whirlpool of insanity. He began beating his arms against the sides of the bed, not even noticing what he was doing, as he tried to regain his stability.

"Child, calm yourself!" Snape's voice said piercingly into the wild mist of terror that was currently washing him away.

But he couldn't obey his teacher, even if it was the teacher who had saved his life more than twice now.

"C-c-can't!" He stuttered in wretched terror, feeling the connections with his body slipping away from the controls of his mind.

His teacher seemed to think on that for a moment before doing something completely out of character for the man. It was almost enough to send Harry into a different kind of shutdown, if it hadn't been for the fact that it felt so very nice.

Snape leaned over his bed and actually _picked him up!_ He put Harry's head on his shoulder and put his hand behind it to steady him, before wrapping his other arm around Harry's lower body. Harry's legs were straddling Snape's torso, and his hands were wrapped around his back and neck.

Harry shuddered onwards, even though Snape was holding him tightly against his stronger, warmer body.

"Oh Merlin," Harry moaned softly against the shoulder that supported his head. He was still crying, but his sobs had begun to get back down under his control. Still, he was unable to quit the bone deep shudders that seemed intent on wracking his spine off-kilter.

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I can't make it stop. Please, I'm sorry," he begged miserably, barely aware that he wasn't speaking to his Uncle.

Snape said nothing to his pleas for mercy, but continued to hold him the way a parent might do with a distraught child.

Harry had begun to think that the man had not even heard him, when Snape said something nearly as surprising as his picking up of Harry had been in the first place.

"Sometimes," his word rumbled into Harry's body more emphatically than the actual word did inside his eardrum, "crying can be a good thing."

…

Madam Pomfrey was not a happy healer.

She didn't give a damn even if Lucius Malfoy was on the board of directors for Hogwarts. That simply did not give him the right to barge into her infirmary at 3:30 in the morning and demand for special treatment!

The aurors had just shown up and carted Lucius off for further questions that she doubted would get anyone anywhere. She just hoped that Severus's well placed knee to his groin would serve as a least a little reminder of what Lucius could hope to encounter should he barge in here again unannounced.

In order to get the aurors, she had been forced to involve the headmaster. However, this latest event would no doubt just re-enforce his already blatant prejudice against the Slytherin house. She had practically been forced to bar the door after the exit of Lucius and his two escorts. Dumbledore had been most adamant about getting in there and poking his old nose into all the places it _should not be_!

She glanced over at her newest patient, praying for all that was holy that he had not been awakened as well. Ron Weasley had thankfully slipped into a deep sleep as soon as the calming drought had made it fully into his system. From what she could see, he was still unconscious and would likely stay that way for several more hours.

She strode quickly into the curtained off backside of her domain and was met with a most surprising sight.

Severus Snape was tenderly holding Potter against him, in his arms no less, and Potter was wrapped around him as well! The boy seemed to be fighting off some now obviously waning tremors—no doubt brought on by anxiety—from what he had just witnessed through the curtain.

She chanced a glance at the other boy on this of the curtains and was deeply relieved to find him every bit as unconscious as the Weasley boy.

She looked back at Severus and raised a questioning eyebrow. Severus looked at her and shook his head, looking back at the boy in his arms, indicating that Potter was still awake and listening.

"Severus Snape," she exclaimed, acting as though she had just walked in there and seen them for the first time. Luckily she was extremely light on her feet and had a penchant for sneaking up on people anyways. Anyone who had spent any time at all in her infirmary would have known that little detail about her.

"What are you still doing on your feet?" She asked, pushing annoyance into her quiet voice.

"Poppy—," he began, _somewhat pitifully_ in her mind, but she cut him off quickly. She chose to ignore the fact that Severus Snape, the dark man of the dungeons, had been caught holding Harry Potter—the _vanguard of the light_ , against his chest in an effort to calm his tears!

 _Really, it was almost funny,_ a voice said naughtily in the back of her mind.

"Did you not hear me when I told you that you needed to stay off that knee?" She said, rushing around to the side where he was holding the boy. She looked carefully at the boy in his arms and decided that those Muggles really were bad news. The boy was much too small for his age.

She pushed down the guard on the side of the bed closest to the two unlikely figures and gestured pointedly towards it.

As Severus stepped closer to the bed, the boy in his arms shook out of his lethargy and added his vote into the mix.

"No!" He said, gripping Snape with his arms and legs tighter in an effort to keep from being put down. Later, he would not be able to explain his actions to anyone, but then in that moment, he knew that he felt safe and given the rarity of that feeling, he was not about to give it up for _anyone_.

She snorted lightly as she caught sight of Severus's surprised face following the boy's proclamation of will.

"I want you _both_ lying down," she said, trying to sound testy, for Potter's sake. She purposely ignored looking at Severus's furious face and began directing him into the bed. When that didn't work, she resorted to pure brute strength and started pushing. Really, as Albus was fond of pointing out, she really was a lot stronger than she looked.

Soon Severus Snape was lying on Harry Potter's bed with said boy draped across him like some kind of gigantic octopus.

Poppy grinned at her potions master with a nefarious look on her face as she tucked them both in and wished them good night. She stopped short of kissing them on their foreheads, but the spring in her step was infinitely obvious as she moved away from the bed. Oh she was far more amused than she could remember being in some time.

Likewise, she knew full and well that she would pay for her moment of glee, but really, it was very much worth it.

…

Severus Snape felt out of place.

In addition, once he got his hands on Poppy, she was going to find herself _several pieces_ out of place. He would have growled, but it would have disturbed the warm, and now stationary, lump on his chest.

The boy was no longer wrapped entirely around him, but instead had been arranged by Poppy so that he was merely all _over_ him. He threaded his fingers through the boy's soft hair and watched in amusement as the child leaned unconsciously into his touch.

He was glad that Poppy had rescued him from standing on a knee that was no doubt swelling from his putting his weight— _and the child's weight,_ what little there was of it _—_ on top of the vicious kick he had received there thanks to Lucius earlier that night.

He knew why Lucius had likely not attacked with his wand first. If he had, it would have set off the wards, and then the entire castle would have been on top of him within minutes.

Severus knew that Lucius's strategy had not been implemented out of any fear for his _son_ being hurt in the fight. Lucius held himself first and all others could be damned. It was something that he himself had learned the hard way. It was also one of the reasons that they had fallen out as friends, but not the only one, to be sure.

He looked back at the small body he was still holding onto. He and Poppy really needed to start slipping the boy some nutritive potions in his midday meal. The boy was far too small and skinny, given his age and country of residence.

He thought about the boy in comparison to the Granger girl. Although they had been through similar situations, they had responded in different ways.

 _Tonight, for instance_ , he pondered to himself. The boy had been in obvious distress, even after he had ended the hyperventilating attack, but he hadn't asked for help. The boy hadn't even really looked at him, even though he was standing right next to his bed. He knew now that the boy's actions weren't some kind of misplaced pompous bravado put up for his professor's sake. The boy didn't know _how_ to ask for help.

 _Or maybe he knew how useless the request would be_.

He felt the boy shudder once more in his sleep, making him wonder if the boy had somehow innately reacted to his thoughts.

He pushed past that thought with a slight grimace and thought back to how he differed in comparison with Granger. Granger had come to him; she had been openly angry with him to his face. In contrast, the boy had worried himself into a concussion, and then into a longer stay in the infirmary once Poppy had gotten a look at his body.

_And then there was the Weasley boy._

_That was an entirely separate bottle of lacewing flies._

Whatever state he had worked himself into was reversible at some level, since he _had_ responded to the double strength calming potion.

 _He responded by sinking into the land of the unconscious_ , he thought in slight annoyance, looking back down at the Potter child.

He gradually discovered that his annoyance for the youngest Weasley boy was slowly evaporating, the longer he looked down at the peaceful face of the black haired child in front of him.


	9. Fully Turning the World Upside Down

By the time Monday came around again, the Misplaced Trio, as they had been firmly renamed in the minds of their classmates, was back together again.

From the outside it appeared as though nothing had changed, but for anyone who actually bothered to spend any time with the three, it quickly became obvious that reality truly was defined in the eye of the beholder.

By Tuesday, their situation seemed to be settling down somewhat, but perhaps that was only because everyone in Gryffindor was pointedly ignoring the topic. Reality, after all, is only so strong as the belief that is put into its understanding.

To Neville Longbottom, Reality was a capitalized word that existed only to constantly remind him of what he wasn't. To him, all steps were covered in marbles and every shirt he wore had a sign woven into its back reading, "Kick me" in bright neon green letters.

For him, Tuesday mornings were the only days—well, parts of a day—where he felt somewhere _near_ normal. The Gryffindors had double Herbology with the Hufflepuffs on Tuesday mornings, and it was here that Neville suddenly found that the world had righted itself from the topsy-turvy mess that followed him around on a typical basis.

That Tuesday morning was no different. Plants just seemed to react well to him and his methods. Unfortunately, the brief respite from insanity always resulted in a harder fall back down to the "normal" plane, and that's where the day took on a particularly demented twist, if anyone were willing to listen to him.

It wasn't until during their afternoon Defense against the Dark Arts lesson with that twisted macadamia nut called "Lockhart" that the bottom suddenly dropped out for him and everyone around him. Unlike most days of wackiness, the craziness did not seem to build gradually, but rather it erupted abruptly into a massive waterspout of hysteria.

From Neville's point of view, and everyone else's as well, Defense was easily the worst class of the week, other than Potions of course. Lockhart blathered on about some adventure he had probably just pulled out of his butt, while everyone fought to stay awake—and away from him. He was known for making the class act out scenes from his books, particularly Harry, who always looked simultaneously mortified and disgruntled at being picked. It was a look that Neville had been secretly trying to emulate, but as of yet had not had much success.

If he had bothered to look in a mirror later during that day's class, he might have seen himself make a similar sort of expression, but it was likely that by that point he no longer really cared that much about such trivialities.

Unfortunately for everyone present, Lockhart chose to "volunteer" _both_ Harry and Ron for that afternoon's "lesson." Even more bothersome was the fact that given the events of the previous two weeks, his choice in picking Harry might have even gone unnoticed by the boy, considering his general lack of awareness for the world around him. His head was filled to the brim with everything that had happened lately, especially late that night with Snape. He was more confused than a niffler in a junkyard.

No, the problem lay in Lockhart's hasty decision in having Ron act out the part of a particularly disgruntled hag named "Pludge." True to the hag's inherent disposition, when Lockhart tried to demonstrate his truly twinkling tickling methods, Ron howled and attacked him.

He attacked out of an adrenaline spurred fear response, somewhat similar to the elbow he had inadvertently thrown into McGonagall's mid-section the other day at dinner. This however, was a bit more . . . animalistic.

Personally, Neville thought he could see hints of the mandrakes in Ron's fighting style; particularly as they had fought their way through the terrible twos. Absentmindedly, he found himself wondering where his earmuffs were as Lockhart shrieked and tried to get away from the furious second year who was still trying to pummel him down to the bloody ground with just his fists.

By the time someone thought to intervene on his behalf, Lockhart was curled in a fetal position on the ground, desperately trying to shield his balls with his hands. His lips moved in time with his breathy shrieks while he prayed to the witch doctor from book 3-a man?—whom Lockhart had made famous after teaching him about herpes clearing potions.

The class was clearly hesitant to involve itself in the fight. Instead, they seemed caught somewhere between horror at Ron's gall to attack a professor, and uncontrollable mirth as they watched the man who was supposed to be teaching _them_ about defense be taken down by a boy half his size.

Amusingly enough, Harry was the one to intervene, and by that point it was only about trying to keep Ron's shoes clean.

"Mate!" He had called out desperately to get his friend's fiery attention away from the creep who lay twitching at his feet.

"You don't want to keep this up Ron!" He bellowed directly at him, his hands forming a makeshift funnel around his mouth.

"You'll get blood on your shoes!" He yelled, desperate for something to get through to his friend.

At hearing Harry's words, the class teetered over the edge and fell into bottomless mirth; some reacting so strongly that they laughed themselves straight out of their chairs and onto the floor.

Regardless, it got Ron's attention, and he stopped kicking wildly at the whimpering cretin below him.

"Mum wouldn't like that much, would she," he bellowed back, oblivious to the mayhem breaking out around him as he looked his best mate directly in the face.

"No, I don't think so," Harry said, shaking his head furiously in an effort to keep himself from laughing. _Why on earth was Hermione not stepping in?_ He found himself wondering offhand.

They soon got their answer to why Hermione was still on the sidelines as they stepped away from the seemingly harmless professor behind them.

"Duck!" She yelled as a strangled curse came from behind them.

They rolled to the ground and the curse hit the wall instead, shattering several of his signed photographs and upending others so that all one could see within the frames was a pair of ugly, half-shaven legs kicking wildly in the air.

 _Hermione had been watching their backs,_ Harry suddenly found himself realizing. He felt as though someone had switched out his shorts with a pair that had been kept previously in a deep freeze locker at the bottom of the lake.

He shivered inadvertently, as he remembered that nothing was ever to be the same as it was before.

From the floor, he saw Hermione pull out Ron's battered wand from inside her robes. She had insisted on continuing to use it, even if all spell work still required a back-up person handy with a fire extinguisher.

And like that, he recognized the look in her eyes and saw very clearly what it was that she was planning on doing.

"NO!" He yelled, reaching out blindly and hopelessly towards her as she cast the spell that had taken Draco down the week before.

Neville watched all of this in fascination, aware that the class had fallen completely silent only moments before the shrieks from the lump on the floor began in earnest. It was a horrendous sound to just stand idly by and listen to without trying to do anything to help. Lavender and Parvati obviously felt the same way, and Neville was somewhat surprised to see them leave the classroom without being stopped. Everyone else just stared on dumbly, with the exception of Ron.

Unbeknownst to the majority of the room, Ron had scuttled on his hands and knees to the back corner of the room following the failed attack by Lockhart. He was currently rocking back and forth; pressing his hands desperately against his ears, in a useless effort to shut out the offending sound of Lockhart's reaction to his dying organ. The longer the sound of Lockhart shrieking went unchecked, the more forceful Ron's body rocked against its sound.

Neville noted with unease as the air began crackling with, what was likely soon to be, uncontrollable wild magic, followed shortly by the sound of the glass in all of the picture frames breaking, up and down the walls. To both muggle borns and those from traditional wizarding families, it sounded like a cross between drunken popcorn cooking and outdoor firecrackers mistakenly being set off indoors.

Neville didn't need to be told to get out of there. His survival abilities might have been lousy, but his instincts worked just fine. He tripped over his bag when he stood up, but had it in his hands in the next heartbeat and was out the door second, just behind Dean Thomas.

By the time Professors Flitwick and Snape got to the room, the only ones left in there were the "Misplaced Three" and a bloody, beaten and still keening Lockhart.

The wild magic was building in the room and was beginning to cause the—now broken frames—to pitch off the walls at an ever increasing, and alarming, rate of speed.

Professor Snape looked and saw Hermione standing in the midst of all the destruction with an unreadable stony expression frozen on her face.

He reached her first and grabbed her arm, yelling "GO!" and pointing at the door. She snapped out of her trance-like look and ran for the door, not even bothering to grab her backpack—another first, if ever there was one.

Next he picked his way carefully over to where Potter lay on the ground, only a couple of desks away from Ron, whom he'd obviously been trying to get to when he'd gotten brained in the head by a flying picture frame. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Filius using _mobilicorpus_ on Lockhart's nearly inert form. He saw his look of disgust at the creature he was removing from the classroom and decided that he would definitely have to kid him about that later on at the dinner table.

He frowned down at Potter's unmoving body as the beginnings of an earthquake began rumbling through the floor of the room. He looked up at the still rocking boy in the corner and decided to try something.

He took out his wand, pointed it towards the Weasley boy and yelled "Stupefy!"

He was forced to dive onto the glass littered ground beside Potter's still unmoving body as the spell shot angrily back at him. He threw himself over Potter and covered his head instinctually as the desk from the other side of the room abruptly exploded, sending a thousand wooden shards violently outwards throughout the entirety of the room. He threw up a shield charm as soon as he could, but still felt more than a few shards cut fiercely into his back painfully. He gritted his teeth and let out a low grunt of pain as he began feeling blood dripping down the sides of his trunk and arms.

He kept his head down, just like he always did, as the mayhem began raining down around them. The boy underneath him moaned piteously and he silently added his agreement as the desks began exploding wildly in the developing maelstrom that was beginning to surround them.

Taking great care, he put an arm more fully around the boy's huddled figure underneath him and began edging backwards, feet first, through the whipping debris. He took great care to keep the boy underneath him at all times, regardless of the shield charm he was hanging onto forcefully just above their slow moving bodies.

He was halfway across the body when he heard the first pain-wracked howl. Instinctively he looked down at the much smaller boy who was still beneath him, but was actually much comforted to see him still unconscious.

Making a leap in logic, he looked up carefully, as he sought to see past the whirlwind howling angrily all around them now. The desperate faced red haired boy had curled in on himself and was holding his stomach, crying wretchedly. It was obvious to Severus that with Lockhart out of the room, the original reason for that afternoon's upset was now gone, and the boy at the far wall was beginning to lose the thread of his anger and dismay. Unfortunately for Ron, it also meant that he no longer had much control over the storm of flying objects that were still thrashing their way madly through the room around him.

The storm did seem to be losing steam, but short of _accio_ ing the boy through the instable mayhem into Severus's likely unwanted arms, and possibly reigniting the stormy outpouring of wild magic, he truly had no way of protecting the boy from the physical environment around them.

So he sighed and then groaned at the feeling the sigh had elicited in his hurt ribs, before gathering his wits about him and inching backwards towards the door once more.

As he went, he felt the pain from his numerous wounds trying to lull him into unconsciousness. In order to combat that calm feeling as he inched through the still moving broken shards around him, he went through a list of the people whom he most despised.

Sitting at the top of that list most prominently was currently Lockhart and his damned need for seeing smiling, glassed in photos of himself all over his classroom. It was the broken glass that was being ground under his joints and limbs that he particularly found himself despising there in that moment.

He swore to himself that if Lockhart survived this experience and he somehow did not, he would come back and haunt the man until he either apologized or died, whichever came first.

 _Or both,_ he thought morbidly.

He was met at the doorway by a white faced and tight lipped Poppy, just as the storm settled completely around them.

Faint with blood loss and in a great deal of pain by this point, he turned and looked up at her with a very annoyed grimace clearly evident on his face.

"I hate Lockhart," he said plaintively before slumping into unconsciousness over the still protected form of the boy whom he had now saved twice in less than two weeks.

When Poppy Pomfrey rolled him over, she was quite shocked to see Potter's relatively unscathed body under his still bleeding and mangled one.

"Oops yourself," she clucked under her breath at the young man who had continued to surprise her, even now in his surly excuse for adulthood.


	10. Dumbledore Gets Annoyed

"Explain to me how a second year can take down a classmate and a professor and not be 'causing any trouble'? As you put it I believe, Minerva?" Dumbledore asked his Deputy Headmistress from within the safe confines of his office.

Minerva glanced down haggardly, wishing she could grab a mouthful from her hidden bodice flask without the headmaster's knowledge before attempting to answer his question.

"Oh Albus, you know as well I do that Lockhart is a pompous fool!" She said angrily, striding across his office to peer directly into his currently non-twinkling eyes.

 _Or at least, he_ was _a pompous fool, before Hermione got her hands on him_ , Minerva thought ruefully to herself.

"And is Draco Malfoy a pompous fool as well?" He asked her, his tone mocking her gently.

"If you really need to know the answer to that question, you need to get out of your tower more often," she answered angrily. She turned her back on him; fully aware of the danger she was potentially putting herself in.

"Oh for goodness sake Minerva," he said, raising his voice a bit, causing her to flinch in reaction.

"I'm not going to hex you!" He yelled, completely miffed at her reaction. "Would you _please_ just take a seat and stop pacing my office like a snared dragon!"

She turned and looked at him until he sighed mightily, and sat down in the seat behind his desk. Only then did she sit down as well, foregoing her manners for once and flouncing nearly as heartily as he had, just with a titch more grace.

"You know," he said, steepling his fingers together in front of him, "normally the person I get these sorts of reactions from is Severus."

She opened her mouth to speak, but he shut her up with a look.

"Yes I am plenty aware that he is currently lying in the infirmary, being tended to by Poppy's most competent hands." He said, leaning back comfortably, non-verbally daring her to interrupt him again. She kept her mouth shut and looked at him with a steely eyed gaze.

"Should I be aware of anything else?" He asked her more calmly, opening his hands as if to physically receive her report of that past afternoon's lunacies.

"He saved Harry Potter's life this afternoon." She said curtly, leaning back and reveling in the look of amazement that the old man suddenly had plastered on his face before regaining control of his emotions.

"Did he now." The old man stated, the damnable twinkle reawaking in his eyes as he looked calmly at her.

"And we don't know exactly what set Ronald Weasley off," she finished, looking at him uncertainly once more.

"May I stand up?" He asked her, still mocking her previous unspoken request for them to _both_ sit.

"Please," she gestured vaguely towards him, making allowances for his ridiculous need to pace aimlessly through his office.

 _Keeps him from getting constipated_ , the voice in the back of her mind quipped semi-hysterically at her. She stifled an urge to verbally tell it to hush, knowing that she got many of her cat mannerisms from that same portion of her mind.

"How is it that an entire class of students, _Gryffindor students_ ," he said, correcting himself, "all witnessed the events leading up to the _outburst_ ," he said, understating the situation completely in her mind, "yet not one has ventured forth with the truth?" He asked, quite pleased with the conundrum he had laid out before the all-too serious woman who was currently fighting to remain still under his unblinking gaze.

"It is a bit odd," she said demurely.

"Really," he said, probing her tight lipped face with his eyes, hoping she would make this easy on herself.

"Gilderoy has been stabilized, last I checked," she answered, throwing a challenge directly back at him. "Why not ask him yourself?"

"Ah, I would," he said, walking the distance over to his floo in just a few steps, his hands loosely linked behind his back.

"If not for this," he said, throwing in some floo powder and directing it to open to the Infirmary side.

At first it worked like normal to her unimpressed eyes, but only at first. He held up a hand to keep her from speaking as he stepped into the green flames that were standard in floo travel.

She sat by herself, momentarily flummoxed by his desertion of their conversation. She was about ready to reach for her flask when the floo belched a green-feathered miscreant onto the floor at directly at her feet.

"Albus?" She asked hesitantly.

"Squawk," the creature said in response.

She looked closer at the figure and was forced to bite her tongue to keep in what surely would have erupted as a loud guffaw on her part.

 _Most unladylike and therefore undignified_ , she felt sure.

It _was_ Albus who was rolling around on the floor covered in ridiculous green feathers, complete with a bright purple beard that only emphasized the equally bright orange beak that sat in the place of where his lips ought to be.

She couldn't hold out, and so she lifted her handkerchief to her mouth, and sneezed out a few peals of laughter into it, taking care not to look at the ridiculous creature before her, lest she lose the fragile control that she had just barely gotten back in the past few moments.

"Squawk," he—it?—said, put its feathery wings on its hips in indignation at her watery eyes. The man-bird of a headmaster was once again standing, but when she looked down in an effort to verify that doubtable claim, she was forced to giggle delightfully at the sight of his clawed tootsies.

"You know Albus," she said, barely holding herself together by this point, now using her handkerchief to dab gently at the corners of her eyes.

"I have often confided in Poppy that your legs looked like chicken legs in your swimming trunks, but I do believe she has reached a completely new level of ridiculous truth!" She said, finding herself lost in peals of uncontrollable laughter at the absurd creation in front of her.

It only got worse when he started hopping huffily around her, squawking forcefully in her face.

"Albus, I don't know how long it will take for this to wear off, but I'm not sticking around to find out. I'm going to dinner. If you're not back to," she cleared her throat delicately, "normal by then, I'll come back and," she forced herself to swallow her laughter, "figure out a way to help you." She said, licking her lips in an effort to regain control long enough to get out of the padded cell that was Albus's office; preferably before losing herself in the [soon to be undeniable] peals of laughter that were fighting madly to get out of her throat.


	11. Fallout

While Minerva was headed down the hallway, mentally promising Poppy several good bottles of Scotch for Christmas that year, Severus Snape was yet again in the infirmary—only this time as a patient.

Harry, having been cleared by Madam Pomfrey to sit up for a few hours after receiving his second concussion in as many days, was sitting next to his beside, quietly and nervously twiddling his fingers as he waited for his professor to wake up. The man had now saved him a total of four times in two years; a bit unnerving for anyone, he supposed, but it especially bothered him.

Besides, waiting was not really Harry's strong suit, and it bothered him that he was upright when the man lying so pale and drawn beside him was not. Hermione had waited for a while with him, but then had seemed to have second thoughts about the whole thing and had flounced off down the hall, mumbling something ridiculous about helping Neville with his potions homework before, during and after dinner.

True, Harry _had_ hit his head rather hard that day, but he was still pretty sure that it was still only Monday.

In the bed hidden by a full set of curtains— _and a silencing spell, hospital issue_ —lay his friend Ron, following his collapse after class. Harry was a bit hazy on the details, but apparently, shortly after a shard of glass had cracked its self violently into his skull, Ron had gone mad and the objects in the classroom had taken turns exploding. And that's all he could get out of Hermione, who presently was the only one who was talking about that afternoon.

It frustrated him to only hear the story from one, vaguely hysterical, point of view; particularly because it was completely aberrant to his understanding of how his best mate thought and interacted with the world around them.

More disturbing than that was the thought that if they didn't figure out a way to make Ron stop freaking out, the school would likely call his parents and force him to be taken home for a term, or a year.

 _Or forever_ , his brain gulped nervously at him.

 _No_. He wouldn't let that happen. They would just get through it _somehow_. He just didn't know how exactly, because that was more in Hermione's ballpark of thinking. Only, she seemed to be in enough trouble of her own, considering the increasingly bizarre forms of classroom behavior she had been exhibiting as of late.

He wanted to groan angrily at the unfairness of the world around him, but he didn't want any unwarranted attention from the dragon lady.

 _If Ron were awake right now, we would laugh about that_ , he thought mournfully to himself.

…

He had made it a firmly ingrained habit to wake without letting anyone notice. He had been using the trick since he had been a child, and it had served him well on more than one noted occasion. Plus, given his high-tuned sense of smell, he often could tell who was around him by just their own underlying unique aroma.

Most people, as he had discovered through a series of long and unofficial trials that he had conducted on his own as a young man, smelled okay, yet consistently unique to them alone, regardless of whatever kinds of cologne or perfume they chose to hide themselves behind.

He had also discovered another important tidbit about his sense of smell when he had been involved with the Death Eaters. The more _genuine_ a person is, the more available their smell was to his nose. Furthermore, the smells of kind people seem to rise to the top, above the others, making it infinitely easier for him to identify the trustworthy ones in a room before ever making their acquaintance.

There was a boy beside his bed who smelled like a cold moonlit night.

There was only one boy with that smell, and so he knew before opening his eyes that Potter was there, just an arm's length away.

"Child," he said, annoyed at the weak sound of his voice. "Shouldn't you be in bed?" He asked, having already prepared himself for the surprise that would surely meet him on the boy's face once he opened his eyes.

"Madam Pomfrey said that it was all right if I sat up for a bit next to your bed," the boy meekly said to him.

"Oh she did, did she?" He asked, raising an eyebrow at the boy who sat beside him looking far too pale and wan.

"I just wanted to say," the boy's voice dropped into a very quiet whisper. Severus fought to focus his mind and ears better in order to hear his words.

"I just wanted to thank you for saving me again," the boy whispered, before dropping his eyes ashamedly, as he tried to hide himself from the man who was probably sick to death of his presence.

Severus, sensing what was probably not being said, carefully lifted a bandaged hand out to the boy and gestured that he move closer. The boy obeyed, but with some trepidation. It comforted Severus to see that the boy was still not automatically trusting of him, regardless of his recent actions.

 _With any luck, this boy may grow to be an old man_ , Severus thought determinedly.

"I appreciate that you thanked me for saving _you_ , as opposed to some heady concept like my saving your 'life.'" Severus said, looking intently up at the boy's pale face.

The boy cracked a small grin at the potion master's slight praise.

"Do you still hurt terribly?" The boy asked, suddenly shy again.

"I've hurt worse," Severus replied truthfully.

"And?" The boy asked perceptively.

"I've felt better," he admitted quietly.

"But if you repeat that to anyone," Severus added, raising a finger and pointing it at the boy forcefully, "I'll deny every word. Understand?"

The boy nodded vigorously, before reaching out and surprising Severus yet again.

He wrapped his hand delicately around the much larger bandaged one that was still wagging in his face, bringing it up to touch his cheek. There, he leaned into the man's touch and closed his eyes. Severus watched in amazement as a blissful expression crept across the boy's face.

Feeling as though he would regret his next words, he sighed and gave into the boy's unspoken wishes resignedly.

"Okay," he said gruffly, feeling guilty as the boy winced a small bit inadvertently at his tone.

"Climb on already," he said, resolutely not looking at the boy and staring firmly at the exciting plain white cloth of the blankets covering his body. He was forced to look back up when the boy continued to stare at him in amazement.

"Do I need to repeat myself?" He asked haughtily, already regretting his words.

"I'm cold, so climb up." He said, noticeably softening the tone of his voice as the boy's face broke out in a genuine smile this time.

"Just try to avoid throwing any elbows or knees into my gut, please," he said in a decidedly _un_ -Snapeish tone.

The boy scampered to do as he said, and soon he had a warm armful of sleepy, smiling boy.

 _I am getting senile in my old age,_ he decided, as his words bounced around rather unconvincingly in his mind.

…

Ron was stuck in the place that sometimes occurs directly before waking. He could hear and think—more or less—but he couldn't move, which included not being able to open his eyes.

All around him, he could hear people moving and talking in low voices. They were talking about the people currently laid up in the infirmary, which he supposed included him.

"They've all three snapped, it seems," spoke a phantom voice at the foot of his bed.

"'Cept for Potter," another voice responded morosely.

"Um, he's sleeping on top of Snape! Or have you lost the use of your eyes as well as your dick?" The voice snapped back, presumably at Draco.

"Big fucking deal," the voice that was likely Draco's responded. "I'm going back to bed. Pomfrey will also start drilling holes in my neck soon if she finds me out of bed." The boy stalked off, leaving the original speaker alone.

"Like a fucking Frankenstein," the boy responded as he snarked to quietly to himself.

"And you," the boy had turned towards Ron now and seemed to be speaking with his unconscious prone form. "You're just too fucked up for words. They say that your parents have been called; they say that they're carting you off to St. Mungos before the end of the term."

Ron suddenly found the ability to moan harshly at the boy's suggestions of all too realistic scenarios.

"Yeah, that's right. Moan. Cry. Hide. Cower. That's all you seem to be good for lately, _bitch_ ," the boy spat out at him, just next to his head— _when had he gotten so close?_

Abruptly Ron realized that he could move. And so he did.

He opened his eyes and sat up in a flash, grabbing the shirtfront of one extremely surprised looking Blaise Zabini, before pulling him in closer, so that they were only centimeters away from one another.

"So you do have some fight left in you," Zabini smirked, covering his surprise with a speed that surprised Ron.

"You don't know _shit,_ " Ron bitterly ground out; finally glad that he could be openly angry with someone, even if they were just a _Slytherin_.

"I know that you _demolished_ a classroom and landed a _professor_ in the infirmary." Zabini said, still staring resolutely back at Ron.

"Fucking _Snape_ ," Ron spat back, trying to ignore the tension-filled bubble that was currently growing in the pit of stomach.

"Yeah, real smart to nearly take out someone that you gotta deal with on a regular basis at _least_ through your fifth year, _dumbass_." Zabini grimaced at him.

"Not if he don't make it through my _second_ ," Ron said, dropping his voice into a steely whisper, and pointing at his chest with the thumbed hand not currently responsible for holding Zabini still.

"Ooo, a threat," Zabini mocked, rolling his eyes. He still wasn't smiling though, which rather ruined the effect, in Ron's mind.

"Do you have any idea how many threats I hear on an average, _everyday basis_?" Zabini asked, his eyes blazing brightly in his dark face.

"No," Ron said, suddenly winded. He released Zabini's shirtfront with a mild push and slumped back on his pillows, exhausted. He could feel sweat beading up on his forehead, and found himself wondering what exactly had happened to land him there in the first place?

"Man, I didn't know that it was possible to look any worse than you did a few moments ago," Zabini said, amusement dancing across his face.

"Shut it you." Ron said, his entire body aching now. The ball of tension in his gut was still there though, and the longer he stayed awake, the more he could feel it expanding itself back through his whole.

He looked at his hands and noticed his fingers were now trembling violently. Scowling in response, he made his hands into fists and shoved them beneath the bedclothes.

"You look like you could seriously use some Fless." Zabini said suddenly, after watching tremors work their way through Ron's lean body.

"Fless?" Ron asked, turning his head only as he looked at the smaller boy in confusion.

"Short for ' _Fearless.'_ " The boy stated quietly, obviously not wanting to draw attention now.

 _Fearless_ , the word rolled itself around Ron's mind excitedly like a wildfire through a rain deprived forest.

"What is it?" Ron asked mildly, trying to sound disinterested.

"It's the answer to fear." Zabini said cryptically.

Ron raised an eyebrow at him and his pathetically exciting answer.

"It's made from the leftover dregs of another potion. The makers take the bottom scrapings out, dry them on a rack, and then grind them up." Zabini said, shrugging nonchalantly.

 _What's the other potion?_ Ron suddenly wanted to ask, but kept his mouth shut. He wasn't sure if he was willing to get that involved. His father's voice could be heard in the back of his mind suddenly: "Knowledge is power." The less he knew, the safer he'd be; that was the way he figured it anyways.

"Where do you get it?" Ron asked, crossing his arms securely in front of him, in an effort to keep from leaning in excitedly.

"I happen to be carrying some on me right now." Zabini said, crossing his arms in imitation and smiling cockily.

"I don't have any money on me here," Ron said, failing to mention that he rarely had any money on him, _anywhere_.

"First three tries are free. It's like a trial version," Zabini said, unconsciously borrowing a commonly used muggle phrase.

 _Free_. Ron was very much enamored of that word.

"When are you getting out of here?" Zabini asked, changing directions on him abruptly.

"I dunno? Tonight maybe? Tomorrow morning at the latest, I should think," Ron said, his brow knitted together in sudden confusion at Zabini's question.

"If I don't see you at dinner tonight, then I'll catch you at breakfast." Zabini said, nodding to himself.

"Wait, you said you had it on you _now_ ," Ron said, a flush rising in his pale cheeks at the idea that Zabini might be trying to double-cross him.

"Listen man, this is the home of the _dragon lady_ ," Zabini said, whispering the last two words urgently.

"So?" Ron asked, whispering too.

" _So,_ " Zabini rolled his eyes emphatically, "she'll _know_."

"Oh." Ron said, suddenly understanding.

"Gotta go," Zabini said, his rabbit like instincts becoming ridiculously clear as Madam Pomfrey suddenly rounded the corner of Ron's bed.

"Bye." The Slytherin boy called out as he walked away.

"Bye." Ron sat pondering the other boy's words long after Madam Pomfrey had finished poking and prodding on him for the night. She was keeping him overnight for observation, but then it was back to normal the next morning.

 _Normal,_ he thought sardonically, _yeah fuckin' right._


	12. Fless

Blaise Zabini wasn't an inherently evil person. He'd even tell you that himself, provided you'd found the right truth serum to coax it out of him.

His parents, however, were an entirely different story.

Blaise had spent most of his life in fear of reprisal from his mum and subsequently whichever man he was currently supposed to refer to as "Dad."

Both of his "parents" would take from each other until each had little to give, and then there'd be a huge fight, his mum would cry, and before he knew it, they'd be moving again.

Sometimes the men would take from him as well, and he gave, because he was afraid of what would happen if he did not.

Like Ron Weasley, he was mighty sick and tired of living his life in constant fear. He was tired of having no one to trust, and he was tired of giving a damn about things that he couldn't change.

He had lied when he had said the first three tries were free. They were _all_ free; the upper level Slytherin boys gave that stuff out practically like candy, with only a few set-in stone requirements regarding the use thereof.

Blaise figured that they got their payment from its Maker, but even he was wrong about that.

…

One of the side-effects that the initial users of Fless were not told about was the nearly savage boost it put on one's libido.

Blaise knew that in order to use Fless, you had to have a "partner in crime," as one of the muggle borns had jokingly referred to it as. That's why he had been in the infirmary initially; he'd been scoping Draco out as a potential partner. Obviously, that hadn't turned out quite like he'd hoped. However, at least he hadn't had his time completely wasted.

He'd never thought much of Ron Weasley as someone who might have potential. But after hearing about, and then later sneaking a peak of what was left of Lockhart's classroom, his views had begun changing. Plus, the spirit that he'd seen shining out of Ron's eyes there in his hospital bed had been almost too exciting to take calmly. The boy was _angry_. He didn't know why, but more importantly, he didn't know anyone _else_ who knew why either. The boy could keep a secret; that was for sure.

Furthermore, he'd been interested in Fless. His want had been clearly written across his face.

…

Fless didn't give you power, it largely just made you _indifferent_ to power.

All of those little nitpicky details of life that got in your way when you were trying to do anything just simply faded away, allowing you to _focus_ more clearly than you ever had in your entire life. Users of Fless noticed a change in their academic habits almost immediately.

Their need to sleep diminished exponentially along with those fears of doing badly on papers that frequently kept young promising students from finishing their work. Given their greatly increased work time combined with a far more highly focused mind, homework troubles soon became a thing of the past as they quickly caught up and surpassed their peers in written work alone.

If the users of Fless could find a way to maintain their addiction levels to those early days, then Fless could potentially become an accepted form of boosting academic prowess.

Unfortunately, although many had tried, the longest one could maintain on those basic levels was a few weeks at most.

In drastic comparison to that, the common average was a week—or less.

The Creator of Fless and its dealers counted on that. They didn't get their dividends in cash, but instead received a far more base kind of payment.

Furthermore, other than dying, there were only two ways to get out of using Fless: Your partner could die, which usually resulted in some kind of year long psychosis for the surviving one, or you could both come off of it—and then, only willingly—at the same time.

Provided there was someone to remind the users of Fless to sleep and eat and do their homework, then it was possible to survive and then even graduate while in the complete throes of addiction.

The people who carried that role were often known as "Faints;" a reference to their sacred brethren, the Saints.

…

True to his word, Blaise caught up with Ron the next day after breakfast. He had watched Ron pick endlessly at his breakfast; slowly growing more annoyed by the minute at the way the boy was just mutilating his food.

Blaise, like Harry, had a finer appreciation for the simplicities of food than some of the students of Hogwarts. As a child, he ate when his mother ate, which frequently wasn't all that often when she was between husbands or boyfriends, or if she was on a drinking binge. Therefore, as he had gotten older, he had learned how to get food when he needed it, and by the age of 6, he was—like Harry, but for different reasons—a pretty decent cook. His mother didn't care about him snitching food, as long as she didn't have to cook or clean up after. Essentially, that was her _problem_ , as far as he was concerned.

Simply put, she didn't give a damn unless it directly involved _her_.

…

But finally, Ron had finished tearing up the perfectly edible, as well as tasty, food before him, and he had begun wandering out of the Great Hall. Blaise saw him look over at the Slytherin table frequently, but had luckily for them both, made no overt motions towards them. Blaise waited until after he saw the tall red haired boy leave the room before following him, covertly. He noticed that the Granger girl was still at the table, unhurriedly working on a bowl of cereal, while the Potter boy was nowhere to be found. He might have taken breakfast in the infirmary with Snape, given his behaviors of late, or he might have been more seriously injured than anyone had known.

It didn't matter; the Potter boy was of no concern to Blaise. He wanted Ron. And for once in his life, he planned on getting what he wanted.

"Psst," he said while walking past the taller boy.

Ron looked down and jerked his head in an obscure nod towards him.

"Got a minute?" Blaise asked calmly.

"Many," Ron answered. It was a cheeky answer, but somehow Blaise could tell the other boy's heart wasn't in it.

Ron's eyes were bloodshot, and there dark circles under his eyes. His clothes, while not being the best quality, had always fit him. Now, they seemed to hang a bit loosely on him; just another indication to Blaise that Ron was deeply troubled about something.

"Follow me to the loo." Blaise said simply, nodding his head towards a side hallway in the direction of a lesser used boy's bathroom.

Once in the bathroom, Blaise waved him over next to the sinks, which were hidden behind the main curvature of the doorway. Blaise stealthily set a magical trip wire which would buy them at least a couple of extra seconds of warning should anyone approach. It was at least a fourth year trick that he'd learned from a friend two years before ever stepping foot in Hogwarts.

Ron's eyes, which had been looking at him dully, suddenly lit up at he turned back to look at him.

"I don't want to insult your intelligence by telling you that if you get caught, you were never here, got it?" Blaise said, going over the formalities with a bored face. He was acting the part, but he was eyeing Ron very seriously, and from the look in the other boy's eyes, he felt that he had gotten his message suitably across.

"Now," he said, pulling the starter vials from inside of one of the many hidden pockets of his robe, "for the initial three doses, we gotta be together when we—ah—partake." He said, handing Ron a small vial of green powder that was barely as long as the length of his thumb.

"That's it?" The other boy asked, incredulously looking at the tiny things that Blaise was holding in his open palm.

"One for you, one for me," Blaise said, nodding.

"What's it taste like?" Ron asked warily, clearly not sure if it was even ingested.

"They say it's sweet, but they also say that it's unlike anything else. So I don't know," Blaise said, shrugging mildly. He looked away from the other boy for a moment before looking back at him, his dark eyes abruptly blazing with want.

"Well," Ron said, "let's do it." He said with his eyes fixed on Blaise's.

"Take it, but don't open it yet." Blaise instructed him, holding his hand out.

"'Kay," Ron said, lifting a shaky hand over to his own. Blaise noted without much surprise that Ron's fingernails were bitten down to the quick.

They both had a vial and now it was just a matter of time before they took that final leap into the unknown.

"When you pour it in your mouth, hold it on your tongue and keep your eyes locked on mine until you feel something happen. Then swallow and we'll see what happens from there," Blaise said, trying to appear cocky, but feeling that he was probably failing miserably.

"I'll count to three, and then we'll open and pour at the roughly the same time, 'kay?" He asked quickly, fearing that the other boy might chicken out.

"Got it," Ron said quietly.

"Ready?" Blaise asked, not really waiting for an answer before starting the count. "Okay then. 1 . . . 2 . . .," he glanced quickly at Ron before saying the next digit, "3."

…

Ron's world had been completely flushed down the toilet when he had woken up that morning only to discover Harry asleep on top of Snape in the infirmary. He'd even asked Madam Pomfrey about it; completely sure that she had just somehow missed it in the night and would quickly put a stop to the hideous aberrance that very moment.

And then the world had shifted around him at hearing her response. Instead of seeing a problem with the situation, she had just clucked a bit at him, before merely laughing gaily _at_ him about how he ought not to be bothering his pretty little head about inconsequential things. She actually had the _gall_ to tell him that it was _nice_ for Harry and Snape to get along after previously suffering so much sniping and mistrust between them before now, and went on to say that she was actually rather _proud_ of them both for working things out.

 _Proud_?

He had thought about telling her how he'd like to work it out with Snape with a fist through his overlarge nose, but had thought better of it at the last second.

Then he had been forced to hold his tongue once more when she had suggested having him eat breakfast there beside the disgustingness that was his best friend and the man who had made their lives hell. Plus, he wasn't sure if he could stand to look him in the eye, even now. Snape hadn't yet mentioned the whole, _finding him in the hall after Draco had done bad stuff to him_ thing, but he still wouldn't put it past the bastard to try something sneaky.

By the time he had gotten to the Great Hall, he was completely sick of everything that his second year was turning out to be, and had just wanted to be around his dorm mates for some regular ol' normalness.

Well, Hermione had been eating cereal, but that had been just about the only normal thing about it.

She, _she_ , of all people there, had lectured _him_ about having better self-control in the classroom. She had said all of that horse wallop to him _after_ cursing their classmate and a professor with a curse of her own creation!

He'd tried pointing out all the mayhem she had caused in the past week, but she hadn't even _tried to listen_ to him about _anything_.

So then he figured that he'd bring up the whole nasty Harry sleeping on top of Snape business. Since she had always hated him too, he figured that would be at least _one_ topic that they could discuss safely.

Nope. She had told him that she thought it was fucking _nice_ that Harry finally had someone to depend on like that. Oh yeah? And what about him? What was he?

" _You wouldn't understand_ ," she had said demurely, completely ignoring his feelings on the matter. After all, _Snape_ had actually been pretty nice as of late, and _really_ he shouldn't _judge_ him so much on petty details.

 _Yeah, like Snape finding him naked in the hallway with Draco's cum still running down his leg_. That's what he had really wanted to say, but had known then that she would have tried to turn it all back against him, or try to claim that he was trying to take away from what had happened to _her_.

The whole conversation had made him sick to his stomach. He was losing Hermione and Harry to the man who had saved them. After Draco had left him to rot, he would have preferred to have been allowed to do so. He hadn't _wanted_ to be saved; he wasn't worth it.

And with that knowledge firmly entrenched in his gut, he wasn't even sure if he even wanted to fight to keep them as friends. Sure, he could keep up the act; he could go through the motions and all, but he really didn't think there was any hope for getting back what they had had _before_.

So when Zabini had gotten to "3," and they'd popped the tops off of their vials, he had been doubt-free as he had poured the unknown concoction into his mouth.

Then, for a second there, before the drug had started working, he had truly experienced what lack of fear really was all about. And he had reveled in the experience.


	13. Perfectly Fine, Thank You

From Neville's point of view, Ron Weasley had come out of the hospital worn out and off his feed a bit, but enough like himself that Neville figured he'd be okay by the end of the week.

Thus, he'd been a little surprised to discover that Ron had gone completely off his rocker by the next mealtime.

He hesitantly had asked if there was anything wrong that perhaps he could help with, but Ron had waved him off—several times, in fact. He had insisted emphatically that he was _perfectly fine, thank you,_ and that he'd never felt better.

Neville, having grown up with a grandmother who was prone towards getting a little sloshed every weekend, holiday and random owl strike, knew that something deeper was going on with his friend than just some kind of crazy sugar high, like Seamus and Dean thought.

He vowed to keep a closer eye on the boy from then on out, like he had been forced to do with his Gran for most of his life.

…

Madam Pomfrey had been somewhat amused by Ron Weasley's hesitant outrage over the sight of Mr. Potter sleeping on top of Severus in her infirmary. Honestly, it was almost as if the boy thought she was blind, in addition to being supposedly old and senile!

 _Old and senile only belong under one man's description here at Hogwarts_.

She snorted quietly to herself as she thought of the green feathered nuisance, as she had permanently renamed him in her head. Now, _that_ was a blind, old and senile creature if ever she had seen one. She knew now that Minerva had obviously agreed with her assessment and also her solution to the problem. Minerva had even solidified—or, rather liquefied—her support by sending over two bottles of high grade Scotch that morning. Poppy had a feeling that the old man would retaliate in some form, but she vowed to be ready for him.

As for Mr. Weasley, she had sent him on his way after only making a token effort of keeping him there for breakfast. Really, they didn't need any more sourpusses wandering the halls of Hogwarts. There were enough already in her firm, but undoubtedly correct opinion.

Besides, Mr. Potter had actually slept the entire night through without needing any more Dreamless Sleep added to his system. She'd always been wary of using too much of that stuff on her patients, especially the young delicate ones like him.

Remarkably, he seemed to do Severus some good as well. She knew that the young man would deny it wholeheartedly, but she was quite sure that he had smiled once or twice in the company of the young boy who was currently eating his lunch beside him.

 _Young Mr. Weasley had just been shook up over that crazy incident that had occurred in Lockhart's classroom_ , she told herself.

And really, it made sense; Lockhart _was_ the type who caused unintentional madness wherever he went. Unfortunately for everyone else, he _wasn't_ the type who could often fix the problems that he frequently caused.

She clucked quietly in his direction before going back to her work.

…

Harry was having a very odd week.

In fact, odd didn't even begin to cover it.

 _Hysterically disturbing_ might work as a placeholder, but he'd have to find something more substantial if he really wanted to be serious about it.

His dreams were still wildly full of fingers and tongues that wrapped around his body and pulled him down until he was underwater and fighting for his life. Currently, he was having the dreams about four times a week. It was being to wear him down more than a little bit.

Plus, turning corners by himself on the way to his classes had apparently become enough to send him into wild crying fits that started and ended with no discernible patterns.

However, falling asleep on top of his potion's master in the infirmary following a whacked out incident where said potion's master had gotten injured in the process of saving his life _yet again_ , didn't seem to faze him in the slightest.

Given his new standards for oddness, Harry figured that something very disturbing indeed would have to occur in order to still pique his interest, let alone bother him.

He found that new thing that night after being released from Pomfrey's care— _finally!_ —shortly after flopping into bed.

"It's dark in here?" Ron's voice asked him bizarrely out of nowhere.

"Generally that's how I like to sleep," Harry said, silently groaning to himself at his answer. He had most _definitely_ been spending too much time around Snape as of late. He thanked Merlin that Seamus and Dean were still down in the common room, and that Neville was passed out cold, if the sound of his loud snores were any indication.

"Oh. It looks light to me." His friend said calmly before falling silent.

Harry lay quietly in the dark for a few more moments before sitting up with a grimace and stalking over to his best mate's bed. Ron's bed curtains were open and he was laying on his back, fully clothed, staring up at the ceiling with strangely bright eyes.

"Have you ever had the length of your legs checked?" Ron asked; flopping quickly over on his side and looking intently up at him.

Whatever Harry was expecting him to say, that wasn't it.

"Excuse me?" Harry asked, narrowing his eyes, trying to figure out if Ron was being serious or if he was just trying to pull one over on him.

"The time between the intervals of your footsteps isn't the same." Ron said matter-of-factly, before flopping back down to lay like he had been when Harry had first walked up on him.

In the interests of keeping his sanity from gaining any more holes, Harry decided not to pursue the conversation.

"I'm going back to bed. Why don't you do the same?" Harry asked warily.

"I don't much think you'd want me sleeping in there with you," Ron answered with a straight face and those still strangely bright eyes.

"I meant that you go to sleep in _your_ bed," Harry said, exasperatedly.

"I tried already."

"Yeah?" He asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Didn't take." Ron said smoothly, crossing his hands behind his head.

"Why not do some homework then?" Harry asked, knowing that if there was anything that made Ron pass out, it was homework.

"Did it." Ron answered quickly.

"Today's?" Harry asked with some surprise.

"All of it." Ron replied.

"Wait." Harry felt that he had to ask from the way that Ron had said those words. "When you say all of it, what do you mean?"

"I did all the subjects." Ron said simply.

"For the week?" Harry asked, squeaking a bit in amazement.

"For the month," Ron said coolly.

"No joke?" Harry asked, unsure of how much he should just believe at face value.

"Seriously," Ron said, turning and staring intently at him.

"What about doing next month's?" He asked, slightly in shock.

"Can't—Christmas holidays," Ron answered in that same clipped tone.

"So," Harry fought himself for control of his remaining sanity, but felt it to be a losing—if not already lost—battle. "I guess you're bored then?"

"As a dingbat," came the monotone reply.

"Well, you could always do _my_ homework too." Harry said, jokingly.

"Actually," Ron answered, sounding intrigued, "that's a pretty good idea." Then he fell silent again, obviously deep in some kind of thought.

Harry stifled a yawn and decided that he could at least go and lay back down while Ron thought.

_And if I get lucky, maybe I'll fall asleep before he talks again._

It was a nice idea while it lasted.

"It'd have to be in your handwriting, wouldn't it." Ron said, not really asking, when he finally spoke again, a few moments later.

"And my voice," Harry mumbled sleepily, unsure of where this was going exactly.

"Right." Ron said. He sounded strangely excited for someone who had never given homework a second thought, let alone _extra_ thought.

And then Harry fell asleep, completely dead to the world, unaware that by that next morning, Ron had figured out how to copy his handwriting exactly, complete even for its mistakes.

His life was quickly turning hysterically disturbing, alongside everyone else's.

…

By the time that Thursday rolled around, Snape was back to his regular routine of grousing, being bitchy, and generally filling all of the rooms he passed through with his own brand of dark snarkiness. He knew that even without the added joy of his being injured earlier that week, that this week's second year Gryffindor/Slytherin class was bound to be more interesting than usual, for the simple reason that Draco Malfoy was coming back to class.

He was most interested in seeing how Ms. Granger reacted to his return, given their last notorious interaction. He had felt it best for all involved if he gave her a warning about the boy's imminent return, however he had not told her exactly _when_ that return would be. He felt that a partial surprise would keep her on her toes, and that's what he had told her too. Privately however, he was looking forwards to seeing just how she would react _this_ time.

He had been fighting the urge to smile ever since waking up and discovering the boy sitting quietly beside his bedside, especially after finding out his reason for doing so.

Most of the children he was forced to teach seemed to approach life in the misguided assumption that the world owed _them_ something. He had found in his years of teaching that students had rarely thanked him for _anything_ , unless they were trying to get away with something. But hearing the son of his hated enemy say thank you to him, after sitting by his bed for Merlin only knew how long, had left a different feeling awake in Severus's heart. He felt certain that the feeling in his heart was responsible for his invitation that the boy climb up into his arms for the second time in as many days.

Few people had ever given a damn about Severus Snape. Poppy, with all of her years of wisdom, was one of those few. In fact, she was likely one of the only ones still alive, at least in their part of the world.

Strangely enough, her isolation as one of the only people who cared about him was beginning to come to an end, as the Potter child had slowly started insinuating himself in Severus's dark existence as well.

It was all so very odd. He had barely done anything for this strange boy; the boy who should have, by all rights, been disgusted with his very existence. Yet, his pathetic efforts at comforting the frightened child seemed to have been enough, possibly more than enough. Severus found himself wondering what kind of people had raised the boy not to expect anything from anyone.

 _Certainly not anything good, anyway_ , he had thought menacingly.

The boy was and had continued to be profoundly grateful for all that he received from Severus. It was a state of living which no one should have been forced to live in, as far as he was concerned. Although his own mother had died when he had been very young, he could still remember her kindness to him. The few memories he had of her had often sustained him later, while trying to survive the hardness that was his bullying menace of a father.

The child's parents had died when he had been less than two years old. It was highly unlikely that he had any memories, let alone pleasant ones, about them whatsoever. In addition, from what he had observed thus far, it seemed that whatever creatures had raised the child had gone and done their best to make him as miserable as was possible.

The thought that someone had tried to hurt the boy like that made him almost ill with rage; especially now, as he had begun realizing just how tender and loving the boy truly was, even to _him_. It made him amazed to think that Lily's inherent kindness was present in her child, even though the boy had little to no connection to his dead mother's presence.

He felt that he simply could not permit the boy's so-called "caretakers" to slowly beat the kindness out of him, like his father had done him. He simply could not allow it to come to pass.

The sadness brought on from his earlier thoughts that day continued to ache in him even after the beginning of his second years' Gryffindor/Slytherin Thursday afternoon potions class; before being squashed far down into the infinitesimal cracks in the cold stone dungeon floor beneath his angrily pacing feet. In its place, he felt only a dry cold fury; unfortunately an all too familiar emotion for him.

It was that damnable Weasley boy's fault. The boy had dared to ignore his presence, even here in _his_ domain. Like his earlier memories had reminded him, it had been the same story for most of his earlier life, but here, in his classroom, it was a behavior that he would no longer stand for. Most students still _tried_ ignoring him, of course, but very few ever actually succeeded. And the thought that the redhead boy, of all people—a term he was using very loosely in that boy's case—thought he could get around Severus Snape just like that!

It was entirely too infuriating an idea even to contemplate, let alone believe or _see_.

And so it had seemed fitting for him to be paired with Draco. It had made perfect sense, really. Draco was an example of how not to act. Surely even _Weasley_ would be able to see that. Surely.

…

"Wow, Snape must really _hate_ you," Draco said, laughing when Weasley was forced to partner with him.

"Why do you think that?" Weasley asked absentmindedly, his mind not really on the class so much, but rather his second hit of Fless that he and Blaise were taking following class.

"Weasel, I'm Slytherin's newest leper," Draco said, still cackling somewhat madly, from Ron's point of view.

 _Fless or not, two can play at this game,_ Ron thought cockily.

"So I heard that you're changing your name." Ron answered, aware that his classmates had suddenly leaned in ever so imperceptibly around them.

"Weasel, do _not_ start with me," Draco said, suddenly deathly calm.

"What'd you say it was Blaise?" Ron said, leaning over to the boy who was sitting barely an arm's length away, his face plastered with a grin almost as grotesque as Ron's.

"No wait," Ron said, holding up a hand, "I remember."

Draco was shooting death glares at the red haired boy who was sitting there with the stupid grin; seemingly unaware of the mortal danger he was putting himself in.

"Draconena? No, that's not quite right. That sounds more like a bad dance from the 90s." He paused for the expected laughter and was not disappointed.

Snape had stepped into his office for something shortly after telling Weasley to move, and was currently listening to all that was going on, thanks to a spell on the door that amplified all of the classroom activities. Internally he felt somewhat justified, but his outwards face was absolutely blank.

" _Weasel_ , I swear you're going to wish you were dead if you shut the _fuck up_ ," Draco said menacingly, pulling his wand and whispering the last two words so that only Ron could hear.

Suddenly Ron found that he was tired of taking Malfoy spit crap at him and his family. Fless had helped him realize a great many things, and that was one of them. He wasn't going to play nice around people anymore; screw who they were. They didn't give a damn whom he was, did they? How did they know that he wasn't going to pull his wand and do something nasty like Malfoy obviously was going to be doing soon enough to him?

They didn't.

They didn't know.

He wanted to laugh with the relief that the realization had brought him, but he didn't want to be distracted lest Malfoy try something.

"I heard that your daddy was going to make you change your last name so that your freakishness wasn't even connected with him anymore," Weasley whispered coldly as he grabbed the front of Malfoy's robes and pulled him in to glare into his frightened little eyes.

Then, with a strength only known to Fless users, he bodily lifted Malfoy off of his feet and heaved him in an arc over their empty cauldron onto the cold stone floor on the other side.

When Malfoy hit the ground, he hit hard, but when he tried to sit up, he did so with a groan. Within seconds, Malfoy was once more in Ron's larger, and obviously angry, hands. He had lifted him up once more, only this time he was holding him up, just looking at him, as his hands tightened around his neck.

"Try begging me for mercy," Ron suggested with a soft malice in his voice unlike anything anyone had ever heard from him.

Malfoy made a gargling sound deep in his throat and looked around the room in a panic. Millicent Bulstrode was purposely looking through her backpack in an obvious effort to keep from looking at him. Pansy was cleaning her fingernails idly, while Crabbe and Goyle were arm wrestling intently with one another; beside them, Nott was passed out cold in the back row like always. Blaise was still grinning at the sight of a Gryffindor holding the life of Draco Malfoy, the former prince of the dungeons, in his hands.

Of all the people in the room to speak up, no one had really expected to hear Harry's voice break through the silence.

"Ron?" Harry's voice asked uncertainly.

When Ron didn't answer, Harry spoke again.

"Ron? I think you've made your point. You should just drop him now, okay?"

"Drop him now huh?" Ron turned and asked his friend with eyes that gleamed with harmful intent.

"Yeah," Harry said very quietly. "Just let him go."

Ron looked back at Malfoy, back at the boy who had helped tear his life apart. Draco's eyes pleaded silently with him from within his purplish-red countenance.

"Why not," Ron said, so softly that only Malfoy and Snape could hear.

And so he opened his fists and just dropped him straight down. Malfoy landed hard and was shortly thereafter joined by a fiery eyed, white lipped Snape.

Soon Malfoy was choking up great long streams of blood tinged bile, so Ron figured he hadn't hurt him too badly. In the quiet mayhem that followed Malfoy's release and Snape's reentry into the classroom, Ron had headed to the back of the classroom where Blaise was standing, so they could take their second hit of the week. Somehow they both knew that they would likely have little opportunity to see one another after class, if indeed there was any _after_.


	14. Chaos Breaks Out

Neville had been horrified by the chain of events in that afternoon's potion's class. True, Draco Malfoy had made many people's lives miserable in the short time he had been on earth, but that didn't give anyone the right to take away his life.

And the look on Ron's face while he had been doing it, _while he had been killing him_ , had been far too much to bear. It had been pure unadulterated _glee_. He was quite sure that he would have nightmares about that look from then on. In fact, it would probably take the place of the faceless figures who often visited him in his sleep, the ones who tortured his parents in the past and who continued to do so his nightmares still.

Draco hadn't been the only one retching following Ron's actions that afternoon. Neville had vomited shortly thereafter, followed shortly by Millicent Bulstrode. It was far too much to bear after all that they had experienced just there in that classroom, so far that year.

Christmas was almost upon them, just little more than a week to go, but Neville had never felt less in the spirit than in that moment when Ron Weasley had almost taken a life with his bare hands in front of a crowd of indifferent witnesses.

It was the sound of Harry's quiet voice that had really pushed him over the edge into sickness. Harry knew about pain and death, and he knew what kinds of consequences occurred as a result. In some ways, they were a lot alike.

And when Harry had spoken, he had heard the unvoiced pain that had often kept him awake at night when he was just a little boy. It was the loss of what might have been that beckoned to him mournfully when he was at his lowest.

Neville's Gran was a formidable woman, to be sure, but from what he had picked up from the conversations around him, largely in terms of what _wasn't_ said, he had to suspect that Harry's relatives were a much worse kind of folk than his Gran had ever tried to be.

There were just some sorts of things that _shouldn't_ happen, and watching a trusted friend almost commit murder before your eyes was one of them.

Neville knew that Ron and Harry had been tight from the very beginning of the previous year. Neville didn't have any friends of that caliber, but he knew that it was hard to stand up to the friends that he did have. He had done it the previous year and had gotten the full body-bind in return. Likewise, he had also won them the House Cup as a result, but really that had only been superfluous thanks. He had done what he had thought was right, because he couldn't have lived with himself very well otherwise.

He suspected very much that Harry was likely feeling that now, only much amplified.

…

Harry felt awful.

On one hand, Draco had hurt Hermione very badly, subsequently causing a schism to occur between him and his two closest friends.

On the other hand, he and the rest of his classmates had watched in horror as Ron nearly killed Draco in a relatively unprovoked attack. And they had just stood by and _watched it nearly happen_.

And Hermione, gods the look on her face had been hideous. He knew that what Draco had done to her was slowly eating her alive. He knew because he felt the same way about Lucius. He would like to see the bastard die slowly for what he had done to him and his life. But, Lucius was a full grown man and had already made his choices for how he was going to live his life. Malfoy was a boy, really. It pained him to think of him that way, but it was true, at some level.

Plus, somehow he kind of felt like the curse that Hermione had thrown at Draco had, at least in part, made up for some of what he had done against her.

Besides, this was _Ron_ they were talking about. Ron did not go around killing people. He hexed people. He punched people. He did not _kill_ for the sheer hell of it.

Afterwards, he had realized that the entire sordid affair must have only taken up three or four minutes of real time. In contrast, it felt like they had stared at Draco's twisting form for more than an hour.

After Snape had gotten back in and had tended to Draco, Harry had sat down hard, staring off into nothingness as he had tried to make some kind of sense out of what was going on in his life. He ran his hands through his hair once, and then twice, before belatedly realizing that he was crying. He looked around for Hermione, but she was nowhere to be seen, even her stuff was gone.

He had curled up in a ball on his chair and had hugged himself to keep his tremors down to a bare minimum. Snape had already taken off down the hallway with Draco moments before, and the class was mostly just drifting away—mentally and physically.

The only difference was Ron and Zabini; they were in the back, laughing about something— _laughing!_

_Ron almost kills someone and then he goes and laughs about it with a Slytherin!_

He knew that one or two of his classmates had thrown up following the conclusion of—what, the Ron-Draco fiasco? What _was_ going on here?

Somehow he couldn't get himself to leave the dungeons, even though he knew that the coldness sinking into his bones certainly wasn't making him feel any better.

He shuddered to himself and watched his few remaining classmates as they milled about, obviously unsure about whether they could or should leave.

And still, Ron and Zabini laughed. It made him think of Dudley and his friends laughing after soundly thrashing him. He would be bleeding, and they would be laughing.

Without even realizing it, he stood up, all tremors suddenly gone from his muscles.

The few who saw his face as he stood up left the room quickly thereafter; they had seen enough for the day, and had no desire to add anything else into the nightmares they would probably be experiencing later.

Harry didn't even notice them leave; he could only see his own small form lying broken on the ground, a result of Dudley's administrations. And truly, he wouldn't have even been forced to deal with Dudley had Voldemort not killed his parents.

As he got closer to the laughing pair, he could hear them openly making fun of the look that had been on Draco's face when he had been gasping for air. Apparently they thought it was almost as good as the furious face that Snape had set upon them shortly afterwards.

Briefly, Harry wondered what they would make of his face. Unbeknownst to him, his eyes were leaking tears again. Neville was one of the few still there, but this time had no thoughts about stopping anything from happening. It was likely that in that moment, his thoughts were in the same place as Harry's.

"Ron," Harry gave a warning as his fist came flying in from nowhere to bloody his best mate's lip.

Ron stared at him in obvious confusion.

Harry decided to clear things up for him.

After throwing another punch, this one connected with Ron's nose, he started yelling at the other boy.

"What the FUCK is wrong with you! You nearly killed Draco in front of the whole class! And I look back here and I see you two just laughing it up like it's no big deal?"

He grabbed the front of Ron's shirt and shoved him into the stone wall just behind him. Ron was bigger than him, but as of yet was not fighting back, giving Harry a definite advantage.

"How can you just laugh about it?" Harry whispered, still crying. "I hate him too, and I would love to see him pay, but not like _this_ ," he said, looking into his best friend's eyes, trying to comprehend the person that the taller boy seemed to be turning into.

Suddenly Neville yelled a warning yell and Harry flung himself around only to be faced with a flying chair that was coming straight at his head. Thanks to his instincts that had been cultivated from many years of living with the Dursleys, he threw himself to the ground and out of the way, unscathed.

He looked up and saw Zabini on the other side of the room from them, with another chair that he had levitating beside him. Then smaller boy magically flung it towards him, and Harry was forced to desperately roll out of the way.

"Whatcha gonna do Harry?" Ron laughed from somewhere about him. "Sweep the whole floor!" he laughed again and Harry saw red.

From his point on the ground, Harry managed to get himself into a crouch, before springing himself at the offending boy.

Following this, several things happened nearly simultaneously that only added to the mess between the boys.

First, Zabini tossed another chair, which Neville reacted to by dousing all of the lights in the room in an effort to wreck the other boy's aiming abilities. Harry, the chair and Ron all hit the floor in a bloody, but conscious heap. Harry, still wildly angry, started throwing punches as soon as he had a viable target.

And then Ron opened his eyes and Harry suddenly found himself scrambling backwards as fast as possible.


	15. Snape is Not Pleased

When Snape finally made it back to his classroom and discovered the unlit torches he feared the worst.

When he relit them all cautiously with a savage swipe of his wand, he was only momentarily relieved not to be met with Death Eaters. The momentary relief was quickly usurped by broiling fury at what the hooligans had done towards destroying his classroom.

However, luckily for everyone in the school, the broiling fury was rapidly displaced by terror at seeing the bodies of two boys lying prone on his dungeon floor, amidst the worst of the wrecked furniture.

He scanned the rest of the room and was momentarily gratified to note that they were alone—at least for the time being.

He delicately made his way over to the nearest of the two boys and checked his life signature. The boy was alive, just unconscious. He turned him over and discovered him to be that fool Neville Longbottom.

 _Really, no surprise there_ , he had thought to himself sarcastically. He had often wondered at the boy's ability to stay conscious as much as he was, considering how accidents seemed to follow in his footprints.

He chided himself for wasting time and made his way over to where the other boy lay, in presumably, a pool of his own blood. He cleared the broken chairs and desks away with a delicate flick of his wand before kneeling down next to the child, heedless of the blood surrounding the slight form of the black haired child.

He knew without a doubt that it was Potter— _Harry_ , and mentally kicked himself for taking so long to get back. He should have taken the offending boy with him, but Draco had been minutes away from suffocation, and so the preemptive thoughts that he might normally have employed had been less than accessible to his harried brain.

He checked Harry's life signature before allowing himself a small breath of relief. Feeling stupidly overprotective, he touched two fingers down and checked his pulse as well. Yes, he was alive, but he was also hurt badly enough to need to visit the infirmary.

He sighed; knowing that Harry despised the infirmary, yet knew there were no other options. He rolled the boy over and hissed his displeasure at suddenly seeing the boy's bloodied and already bruising broken nose. Not only that, as he soon discovered, but the boy's lip was split and he had the beginnings of a rather spectacular black eye.

Severus felt his ribs as well and discovered that the boy had at two cracked, if not completely broken, ribs.

As he carefully lifted the far too tiny figure into his arms, he thought dark thoughts against those who had done this to him.

Given that the two boys here in his classroom were not faced with life threatening problems, he opted to use the floo, in order to get Harry the fastest care possible.

Later it would bother him to realize that he had started referring to Potter as Harry, but in that moment, he was less than observant with such trivialities.

…

Poppy looked up as Severus stepped through the infirmary's floo, a small bundle wrapped tightly in his arms. The look in his eyes was just short of murderous, and she instantly knew what—or whom—he was carrying in his arm.

"Is he-?" She cut off, not wanting to voice her question out loud.

"He is alive." Severus answered grimly, before heading to the nearest bed.

He leaned over the bed to put down the child in his arms. The tender gentleness in his motions shocked Poppy for a moment, before she automatically switched into her professional mode.

She was, by all rights, therefore annoyed when she saw Severus turn and head back towards the floo without another look behind him.

"Where are you going?" She growled roughly at him, the displeasure evident in her voice.

She thought she saw a smirk pass across his unusually pale features as he turned around to look at her, but could not be sure, as his face quickly became more harshly blank than was typical even for _him_.

"He was not the only boy injured. Longbottom is still sprawled unconscious in my classroom floor, even as we speak." He answered, speaking in a deadly calm voice.

"What are you doing leaving him alone in a state like that?" She demanded; the outrage clear in her voice and across her face.

"Indeed," he said. He turned back around, tossing in the floo powder as he went, giving the instructions in a terse, but audible voice.

As he disappeared through its traditional green flames, she found herself clucking quietly in annoyance at being outmaneuvered by him and his dark wit.

Her annoyance soon faded when she looked down onto the sight of the boy-who-lived and his current sad appearance. Quickly, she banished his clothes and began running diagnostic spells in an effort to determine the extent of his injuries. What she found upon her initial investigation prompted her to run more spells that went deeper into the history of the tissues of his small frame.

At some point, Severus had appeared beside her, supplied with pain and bone healing potions that he began spelling into the young boy's stomach.

When she finally sat down next to the boy's bed, she was exhausted by what she had found and done in healing what she could towards his injuries.

Always perceptive—often to the point of annoyance, from her point of view—Severus pulled up a chair across from her and sat as well, looking inquisitively into her shocked face.

"What did you find?" The damnable man asked her calmly.

"Contusions along his sternum; two cracked ribs, not broken, thank Merlin; a broken nose; one black eye—you were right when you described it to me as 'spectacular'—he's lucky not to have lost his sight completely; two broken teeth directly behind a badly split lip-," she trailed off, looking at her hands uncomfortably.

"There's more." The man stated, his face becoming darker as he waited for what was presumably bad news.

"Injuries like this," she said, waving a shaky hand towards the now sleeping boy, "were all too common in his past, it seems." She said, taking a wavering breath inwards before continuing on.

"That, combined with the s-sexual trauma I discovered in these latest scans, indicates that he is no stranger to severe abuse." She finished, trying to keep the tears from dropping out of her eyes. She would not allow herself to be overcome when doing her work, but now that the boy was stable, she was able to allow herself the liberty of feelings once more.

"How severe was the sexual trauma?" The man sitting across from her asked, pulling out a dark green handkerchief from inside one of his many inside pockets, and handing it to her unobtrusively.

"The scans indicated he that he has endured years of inappropriate, um, _handling_ , by his—I'm assuming—supposed caretakers. Moreover, in the past six months, likely the month before he came back to school, he was forcibly raped no less than three times." She dabbed Severus's handkerchief at the corners of her eyes delicately, unable to emotionally comprehend how someone—especially family—could do such horrible things to such a sweet little boy.

Across from her, Severus sat in stony silence, his emotions tightly sealed by his less than openly reactive countenance.

"And the physical abuse?" He asked, almost hesitantly, after another moment of heavy silence.

"The scans reveal that he has been the recipient of numerous harsh and prolonged beatings. Since there is virtually nothing in his medical records to indicate the treatment of such severe injuries, it is likely that nothing was ever done to heal them, beyond his own meager means." She stopped talking and resumed staring at the floor, obviously in shock at what she had discovered that evening.

Severus swore under his breath, before hastily wiping a hand over his lightly sweating face.

She watched in passive silence as he tightly shut his eyes and ducked his head, obviously trying to work something out in his mind. She watched as the emotions flickered across his face, causing him to clench his jaw against their obvious instability. She knew that she was one of the only people, if not _the_ only person who was allowed to see him work through his emotions so openly as this.

 _And even so, I still don't really know the full truth of what goes on behind that mask of his_.

Although, she had often found herself wondering if she really _wanted_ to better understand the darkness that existed behind his quiet and often icy persona.

She saw him finally open his eyes, but instead of looking at her, he turned straight to where the boy still lay. For an instance, she suddenly could see his emotions clearly—they were etched deeply in the lines around his weary eyes—and then, it was as if a switch had been flipped, and he shut himself back off with an angry jerk, standing up as he did so. He paced the floor of the quiet infirmary like a furious wraith, seeming able to naturally wrap the darkness of the room around him like a shield against any who might dare intrude on his angry solitude.

 _In some ways,_ she mused, _he is not so very different from how he was as a teenager._

Suddenly feeling the need to break up the monotony of his building rage, she decided to bring up a thought which had shoved itself into her mind late the previous night.

"Severus," she said, forcing herself to suppress a shudder as he turned cold depthless eyes towards the sound of her voice.

"Given Gilderoy's absence from the classroom," she said, smiling a bit at his snort of disgust at the mention of the ridiculous man, "and also considering young Harry's proclivity towards injury and attacks," she said, grateful to have captured his attention, "it would seem prudent—especially now—for him to be taught a few simple shield spells."

"And who do you suppose should be responsible for teaching him?" Severus asked, with only a small sprinkling of exasperation in his tone, she was pleased to note.

"Well," she said, with a great dramatic sigh, "I suppose we could ask Gilderoy for another week or two of service, but given that he is currently responsible for keeping St. Mungo's afloat, from the limited space of his bed . . ." she trailed off at Severus's unhappy groan, which was shortly followed by a hand over his eyes in obvious exasperation for the worthless excuse of a wizard.

"Fine." He muttered with a low groan, apparently hoping that his quick agreement to her unspoken request would stave off any more mention of that damnable idiot.

"Oh good," she said brightly, with an over-the-top cheery grin on her face, which was quickly outdone, at least in fervor, by his responding scowl.

"You always get your way." He said, crossing his arms like a petulant child who had just been denied a sweet.

"Some of us are just good like that," she said, crossing over to where he was standing to quickly peck his cheek before skittering away quickly, in order to avoid being slapped on the rump by the embarrassed potions master.

She smirked at him from the other side of the room, content that she had successfully drawn him out of his angry darkness once more.

He scowled at her once more, before softening his features unconsciously as he stepped up beside the young boy's bed. She watched as he delicately lowered the side guard, taking obvious care to avoid disturbing the child's much needed rest. The boy's body barely made a noticeable lump under the covers; something that she was certain did not go unnoticed by Severus.

She watched as he carefully pulled the boy into his arms, setting the boy's head carefully on his shoulder, before climbing on top of the bed himself. With a barely perceptible flick of his wand, he rearranged the pillows so that they would comfortably prop up his significantly larger body. Then he leaned back slowly and carefully, clearly not wanting to jar the sleeping boy, who was currently being held firmly against his chest by his protective arms.

She sensed his need for privacy, so without another word, she quickly extinguished the remaining lights in the room and started making her way back towards her private rooms.

Even though it was dark, her peripheral vision still caught the undeniable image of Severus laying his head gently down upon the boy's smaller head in an undeniable gesture of concern for the sleeping child in his arms.

The image reminded her of another one she herself had been involved with many years prior.


	16. Lust

Ron knew that he and Blaise were in a shitload of trouble. He knew that easily enough, but had quickly discovered that it didn't really matter much to him.

Something had happened after the lights had gone off there in Snape's classroom. He couldn't quite remember what they had done, but then again, he couldn't really remember much of anything about the time before the Fless anyways. As memories go, Ron's were quickly becoming rather disorganized.

When Blaise had suggested that they go back to the Slytherin dungeons—a thought that normally would have filled him with uncontrollable fear and dread, if not for the Fless running rampant in his system—he had found himself agreeing without a second thought.

On the way there, they had ducked into yet another out of the way boy's bathroom and impetuously decided to take their third hit of Fless right then and there. They had linked arms that time and had ingested the slightly sweet green powder with large idiotic grins on their faces.

It had been at the conclusion of the third hit that had finally sparked certain ideas into reality for the two boys. Previously, those concepts had only been hesitant suggestions floating amidst the backwaters of their minds, but now the sensations they were facing were far more uncontrollable.

Ron had succumbed first by shoving Blaise into between the sinks and kissing him savagely while running his fingertips over the other boy's body like thin rivulets of waters during a rain shower. For a moment, Blaise had been shocked by the other boy's sudden actions. Blaise knew that Ron was one of the straightest guys around, and for him to behave in such an off-kilter way meant something—probably a very important something. His mind literally trailed off into nothingness as Ron's lips and hands sparked emotions and sensations in Blaise's body that he hadn't even known he was capable of having.

Another little known fact about Fless was that its potency was amplified through the sharing of bodily fluids with other users.

Ron felt an undeniable thrill in thrusting his tongue violently in and out of the other boy's mouth right there in the open of a boy's loo.

 _Hell_ , he thought wildly, _we aren't even in a stall!_

And then nothing mattered much except for the extreme sensations of hot wetness intermingling with the hardness of his dick in Blaise's surprisingly skilled mouth.

When had he dropped his pants on the floor?

Blaise's tongue accentuated every feeling that Ron felt while in the glorious deep channel of the other boy's mouth. Up until now, Blaise had done everything to him, but he realized with a sudden gut wrenching lurch that he needed _more_. So he wrapped his hands around the boy's head and began fucking his mouth, trying to determine just how _far_ he could make his dick go down the other boy's throat before something unpleasant—like Blaise suddenly vomiting or passing out—occurred. Apparently he could go quite a ways back, he soon discovered with a quiet shuddery gasp as Blaise began moaning around his already sensitive tip. He felt the tension building deliciously, and he pushed himself as far as he could go into Blaise's tight spasming throat as he orgasmed deliciously into the extreme tightness that had completely enveloped him to the root.

He pulled out then and kneeled on the floor to make sure Blaise was okay. He soon got his answer as Blaise threw himself at Ron, pushing him back flat on the floor of the lavatory and kissing him savagely as he grabbed and pulled Ron's hand to his blindingly hard length, just before he began thrusting sporadically against it.

Ron instinctually curved his hand into a loose fist, allowing Blaise something to thrust _into_. Ron could feel the pre-cum dribbling from the slit and used his fingers to spread it around, further adding to the overwhelming qualities of the moment that were just making things fade into the background behind them.

He could feel Blaise's body shuddering with unspent emotion tension as he began heading to the edge of orgasm. He could hear Blaise gasping sharp little breaths of need directly into his ear.

"More, more, Ron, I _need_ you so badly," Blaise panted desperately against his sweating neck. He bit down onto Ron's neck then, onto the soft silky part that was just a little bit above his collarbone, and then held on for dear life, sucking as much of Ron's skin into his mouth as was possible.

Ron could feel the folds of his neck being pulled in Blaise's hot mouth rhythmically, now in the place of his breath. He felt as though his skin had become a replacement for oxygen, as though Blaise were swallowing him down, piece by wonderful piece.

He tightened his hand around the other boy's dick, rubbing his thumb roughly over its tip, once and then again, even as Blaise began shuddering uncontrollably in his hands, soon covering Ron with long pearly streams of his spunk.

Next to Ron's neck, he could hear Blaise's harsh gasping, even as he sucked away the excess moisture that was left there from the ministrations of his mouth.

Somewhere in there, Ron had come again too, but he was barely aware of it, given the amazing force that Blaise had come with into his hands. They were still shuddering together, as Ron suddenly realized that he could _feel_ Blaise's sensations running up and down his limbs like a soft wind pushing past him.

"Oh you're amazing," they both said, speaking simultaneously without realizing it.

Suddenly they desperately realized the need to fuck the other hard into the ground.

"Fuck," Ron said, turning to his cohort.

"Or be fucked," Blaise said, running his fingers lightly over Ron's still mostly clothed torso.

"Gods, I want to touch you everywhere," Ron said, looking longingly at Blaise's lean body.

"With your fingers?" Blaise asked, somewhat mischievously.

"You know better than that," Ron said, poking him lightly. "With my tongue obviously." He said wantonly towards the other boy.

"But not here." Blaise said, voicing both of their thoughts.

"No."

"Come with me then," Blaise said, standing up and wrapping his hand around Ron's come covered one.

Heedless of their mess, the two boys left the bathroom as soon as Ron had secured his pants once again around his waist.


	17. Revelations

Harry awoke feeling unusually safe and warm. It was a very odd sensation to experience, considering the history of his childhood. He thought back to his last waking memory and shuddered with the images therein.

He noticed that the object that he was laying against was moving up and down only mere seconds before he realized what, or whom, it was.

"How do you feel?" Professor Snape asked from somewhere just above him.

 _Fine_ , he was going to say, before remembering whose presence he was in.

 _And on,_ he thought, with a rare wry amusement.

"Scared," he said softly, not sure who might be listening in. He was fairly positive he was in the infirmary once more, based on just the smells that had greeted him upon waking.

The arms around him tightened a fraction, filling him with a sense of calmness. With a rare level of certainty, he knew that he was safe in this position. Therefore, he fully intended on taking full advantage of the safe feeling as long as it was extended to him.

He knew that he was protected here, and the strength of that knowledge seeped through his body delicately, filling him with something that he had no words for.

"I do not wish to rush you, but I need to ask." Snape's voice reinserted itself into his mental awareness with the sentence.

Harry had a feeling that he knew what was coming next, and although he desperately dreaded discussing the upcoming topic, he knew that this man would not cause him any unnecessary harm in doing so.

"Okay," he said, pressing his head in tighter against Snape's lean torso. He closed his eyes in an effort to try and hide from his memories, but knew that it was ultimately a fruitless endeavor.

The man above him leaned over and rested his chin on Harry's head, almost as though he was trying to pull Harry even farther into his chest.

"Child," the man asked him softly, nearly as softly as Harry had spoken prior, "please tell me who was responsible for hurting you."

Harry choked on a sob at the phrasing the man used to ask his question. It was perhaps the first time in his life that he could remember having someone—an adult someone too—be concerned about his being hurt.

He opened his mouth to answer, but was surprised to hear himself begin to cry instead. His tears broke through the thick wall of bravado that he was forced to employ around nearly everyone, particularly the Dursleys.

He heard Snape mumble something and soon realized that the sounds of the room around them had faded into nearly nothingness around them. Maybe he could get Snape to teach him the spell later, when he had remembered how to speak.

His tears were still falling thickly down his cheeks when he tried to speak again. He took a shuddery breath and opened his mouth only to be hushed gently by Snape, who continued to shock him even more as he began rubbing soothing circles into his quavering back with one hand, while the other brushed his hair out of his eyes gently.

He had thought that Snape had finished surprising him until the man started speaking.

"When I was a young man," the man said in a haltingly quiet voice that Harry had never heard him use before, "I was betrayed by someone very close to me."

Harry tried to sniffle unobtrusively and grateful when Snape handed him a handkerchief. It did not surprise him to see that it was green.

"Was it a friend?" He asked, finally finding his voice again after being soothed by man's gentle touches on his back and head.

"Yes," Snape answered, bitterness thick in his tone.

"What happened?" Harry asked in a wary whisper.

"In a fit of drunken foolishness," Snape said, stopping for a moment to apparently gather his wits about him, "my _friend_ decided that he wanted to," Snape stopped again, before going on with a choked sound in his throat, "bed me." He finished the sentence with a low croaky sound in his voice, and Harry wondered for a moment if he might cry as well.

While Snape's chest did shudder a bit under Harry's body, it soon died down as the man quickly regained control over himself, and wisely, Harry kept his silence the entire time.

"You mean he—?" Harry couldn't say it, not to himself and certainly not to Snape.

"Yes. He raped me," the man answered, the emotions still very fresh in his voice, even though it had obviously occurred many years prior.

Harry couldn't comprehend the idea of anyone getting away with being able to rape the frightening potions master of the dungeons that Snape was— _or seemed to be_ , his mind pointed out.

"Is he dead?" Harry asked, dumbfounded at the idea that a big strong man like Snape could be hurt like that, like—like he had been.

Snape barked a harsh humorless laugh at Harry's question.

"I only wish," he said roughly, pulling Harry in closer to his body once more, apparently in an effort to reassure himself that the boy really was still there.

"Is he still around?" Harry asked, whispering still, suddenly feeling cold all over. If a man could hurt someone like Snape, then he certainly didn't want to meet him.

"Yes," Snape ground out tightly.

Harry glanced up at him for a moment and was surprised to see that Snape's eyes were shut very tightly in his tense pale face, obviously from the effort of reliving his nightmare.

Harry, having little idea of what to do to comfort the obviously tortured man, merely wrapped his arms tighter around Snape's body and held on in an effort to let his professor know that he wasn't going anywhere.

Finally one last question occurred to him that he knew he could not leave be.

"Do I know him?" Harry asked, suddenly wanting to take back the question as he became far too aware of the reality of the phrase, 'ignorance is bliss.'

Silence existed between the two for the next few moments, only broken by the sounds of their breathing, combined with the sound of Snape's heart steadily pounding under Harry's still head.

But finally, Snape's chest tensed under Harry's body and he spoke.

"His name is Lucius Malfoy," Snape's voice whispered, speaking in the most dead sounding voice that Harry had ever had the misfortune to hear.

…

He didn't know why he had suddenly decided to tell Harry about one of the worst nights of his life. He didn't know how he could have thought telling a boy about something horrific could possibly do any good whatsoever.

So when he felt the boy's arms tighten around him, he had been surprised by the boy's continued willingness to remain in his company. He had been surprised enough to tell him more about the man who had hurt him back in his adolescence.

Then the boy had asked him whether he knew him, and he knew in that moment that he would have to tell him the man's identity. Really, why had he told him the story if not to tell him the identity of his assailant?

So he decided to make himself say it, that he and Lucius had once been friends, only that he was to be hurt for his efforts.

The boy, at hearing the full truth of the situation, became deathly still in his arms, to the point that he almost wondered if he hadn't passed out from the shock of it all.

"Harry?" He asked, touching the boy's cheek softly with a stained index fingertip.

The boy looked up at him, his eyes very wide and large in his extremely young face. From this position in his arms, Harry looked like a baby primate peering out from under his parent's arms. If the situation hadn't been so serious, he would have been forced to laugh at himself for that hideous mental comparison.

Hell, maybe he still would later on.

He was fully aware now that his understanding of the world around him had been turned on its ear, as Poppy was inclined to say. It seemed to him that the more time that he had spent in this boy's presence, the odder the world worked around him.

The boy was still looking at him shyly, and he wondered how much time he had spent thinking.

So he decided to do something that was completely unexpected. He pulled another page from Poppy's book of behavior. He leaned over and kissed the boy lightly on his forehead, just above his distinctive scar.

When he looked back down at the boy, he wasn't particularly surprised to see tears in his bright green eyes. He was however, somewhat surprised to see something like admiration staring out of the boy's face as he continued gazing at Severus's face intently.

He wanted to tell the boy in his arms that he shouldn't waste his time admiring a fool like him. He wanted to tell him that he was nothing but a wretched man who had never been worthy of anything, but he chose instead to say nothing to the child who had obviously never experienced being protected, not even by a man as wretched as Severus Snape.

"I won't let him hurt you again," Severus promised the child in his arms. "I won't let any of them hurt you again," he amended, adjusting his statement to include any and all of the boy's tormentors.

"But who will protect you?" The boy asked, reaching out a thin arm to lightly touch his lightly stubbled cheek.

Severus looked to the other side of the room to where Poppy was standing, watching them quietly from the other side of his silence charm.

The boy turned his head to see what had gotten Severus's attention.

"See Madam Pomfrey over there?" He asked Harry softly.

"Uh huh," the boy answered solemnly.

"That's who protects me." He said, speaking the truth for the first time in many years. She had watched out for him when he had been in her house, and so it was little surprise to him that she continued to do so, years later.

"Gosh." The boy said in awe. "You must be pretty safe if you've got the Dragon Lady watching your back," he said, grinning a bit up him.

He snorted at the boy's name for the woman and her fiercely protective nature towards her charges.

"Pretty safe," he agreed simply.

And then they fell silent again, only this time the silence was far more comfortable to wait within.

Finally though, the boy looked up at him, and he was discomforted to see the fear that was once more apparent in the boy's face.

"I want to tell you who hurt me and Neville," the boy said speaking in a rush.

"Okay," he said, feeling suddenly that their roles had suddenly flip flopped.

"But you gotta promise that you'll find some way to help him and not just have him expelled," the boy said, his eyes intensely probing Severus's face for reassurance that he was making the right choice in trusting him.

"Why does he need help?" Severus asked, narrowing his eyes in confusion.

"Because something was seriously wrong with them!" Harry answered emphatically, with more than a little terror creeping back into his features.

Severus watched as the boy seemed to shrink into himself, bringing his knees into his chest and pulling his arms from around Severus to wrap instead around his own small—now shivering—body.

Severus decided not to focus on Harry's change in body position, but instead merely gathered the small— _lump of boy?_ —tightly wound body into his arms carefully, holding him more as he would a frightened kitten, than the boy he really was.

He realized then and there that the boy's fear initiated response did serve some kind of purpose for the child, in that his form now presented a much smaller target to anyone who chose to attack him.

"I promise," he said, as he forced himself to speak his words calmly, "that I'll do whatever I can to make things right once more for you."

Almost imperceptibly, he felt the small head next to his shoulder nod his understanding of what it had cost Severus to make that promise.

After all, Severus was not the type of man to make idle threats—or promises.

Having established that, Severus watched as Harry proceeded to drop the second bombshell of the evening, through his revealing of whom was involved in the attack against the two Gryffindor boys.

Severus tried to keep his outward features calm and the tension in his body low, after having finally realized just how unusually perceptive the boy was towards moods and the non-verbal language of those around him. Painfully, he realized that the boy's hypervigilance was likely yet another survival technique that he had picked up after spending so many years with those slugs that had posed as his worthless family.

After a few more moments of companionable silence between the two abuse survivors, Severus finally realized that the child's body had begun relaxing in his arms. He knew that the boy needed to eat something soon, but he had already decided that he would not be the one who kept the child from falling back to sleep, if he was able.

And so, upon feeling Harry's body continued relaxations, he decided to try and perch the boy's head back on his shoulder. It seemed right that his head be there, and besides, Severus found the presence of Harry in his arms to be a comfort to him as well.

Within a half hour, both the boy and the man had fallen back to sleep, each granting the other unknown amounts of reassurance just because of their proximity to one another.


	18. Reconnoitering

It was the weekend and for once, Harry was not in the infirmary. He had been discharged that Saturday morning and had gone back to the Gryffindor tower in order to try and possibly catch up on some of his wayward homework assignments.

Snape had left him around noon on Friday, to go prepare his lesson plans for that afternoon's classes. Before leaving, he had ruffled Harry's already ruffled hair and had smirked at him. Harry thought that was as close as the man ever got to smiling, and therefore was internally pleased with the sight.

Luckily the password had not changed in the past couple of days, allowing him to pass by the Fat Lady without too much problem. Although it was still relatively early for a Saturday morning, he was surprised to see that there were a fair number of students milling about in the common room already. The sight struck him as slightly odd until he realized with a start that most of them were redheaded boys. He looked around for Ginny and caught sight of her huddled in the corner next to Neville, of all people. Their eyes met and he waved hello. She waved back meekly before turning bright red and hiding behind Neville's much larger frame.

The noise of the room—which hadn't been too impressive, considering the number of Weasley siblings together at one time—suddenly died off completely as they noticed Harry's presence.

It was a moment of silence that was followed by pure bedlam, as they all rushed at him at once. It was a good thing that he had spent a fair amount of time around them that previous summer, or it was likely that he would have been overwhelmed.

They were all speaking at once, and although the conversations were fairly muddled, the issue was soon made clear: Ron was apparently missing. Harry listened in growing exasperation until he had finally had enough and after shouting loudly at them all, he finally got them to calm down enough to hear precisely what was going on.

Percy, although usually a royal pain in the arse, took point as he was wont towards doing, and hastily explained the issue.

"So you see Harry, we figure that the last one to see him was you. Neville here," there he stopped to wave vaguely in the direction of the younger boy, "says that before he lost consciousness, he could still hear the sound of your voice."

From there, the twins jumped in to add their two bits.

"Right," they said in unison, looking at him intently.

"So we thought—," said Fred, or possibly George.

"That given the sorry state—," quipped George, or was it Fred? Harry was too tired to figure it out.

"You must have been in," they said, speaking simultaneously once again.

"To have gotten laid up—," Fred said. Harry was almost positive that it was Fred speaking, really.

"A full day longer—" pointed out George.

"—Than Neville here," they said, both pointing directly at the smaller roundish boy.

"There must have been—," George continued.

"A fight or ambush of some kind," Fred said, finishing with a flourish. Harry shook his head mildly to try to make sense out of what he had just been told.

"So was there? A fight?" Ginny asked, peering closely at him from where she stood. It annoyed him to no end that they were nearly the same height, even though he was a full year older.

Harry, having just been released from Madam Pomfrey's care that morning, decided that healed or not, he did not want to go into a detailed conversation with the overexcited Weasley siblings while standing in a corner surrounded by the lot of them. He looked around the room before spotting an empty couch and resolutely made his way there before deigning to answer. Besides, it was a question that he would have most preferred to have avoided discussing— _at all_. However, given his very clear lack of choice, he felt that the walk had at least allowed him some stall time.

He sat down on the couch, slightly disappointed that the world hadn't ended during the short walk there. Ginny sat shyly down next to him, before insistently waving Neville over to join them. Percy, like the young gentleman he was, pulled up a chair primly, while the twins dropped lightly onto the floor at their feet.

Harry saw Percy roll his eyes at twins for what he likely thought of as childish behavior. Under other circumstances, Harry might have laughed at him with Ron—but now that thought merely served as a reminder to the incredible pain that he had felt throughout his body just prior to succumbing to the darkness of unconsciousness that previous Thursday.

Neville looked painfully at him as Ginny once again reiterated her desire for him to tell his account about what had happened with Ron after Potions on that fateful day.

"Neville's been less than useful in giving us a clear account of occurred then," she said, sticking her tongue out at Neville, obviously miffed at him for his lack of details.

"Wait, so hasn't anyone heard from Ron since then?" Harry asked, breaking into the spat before it could probably get going.

"No one has, mate." Fred said, looking at him with a strangely somber look on his face.

"Do your parents know?" Harry asked, suddenly becoming aware of the large scale problem.

"Mum suspects something, but we've been holding out on her in hopes of finding out something more definitive from you, chap," Percy said, obviously trying to sound regal and failing miserably at it. The worry for his younger brother was clearly evident on his face, and Harry noticed that all of the Weasley's looked much more haggard than usual.

"What did Neville say about that day?" Harry asked, still actively avoiding the act of recounting that awful experience.

"Told us about the lights goin' out—," the twins said before being cut off by Neville himself.

"'Cause I was trying to screw up Zabini's wicked aim with those chairs he kept using his wand to toss at your head, Harry," the boy said, looking anxiously up at Harry with an obvious need for reassurance written into face.

"It was a good idea," Harry said, somewhat absentmindedly as his brain was once again caught in the vivid memory of the incident.

Neville was still looking uncertainly at him, so he leaned over to him, touched his shoulder and said, "Really Neville. It was a brilliant idea."

Neville responded with a bright flash of teeth as he smiled, obviously pleased with Harry's compliment. Harry found himself entranced by the change in disposition the compliment had made upon the slightly overweight boy.

 _Maybe he just needs to be complimented once a day, kind of like a flower needs to be watered in hot weather,_ he mused to himself.

"But that's where his account more or less trailed off," Ginny said, pointedly bringing Harry's attention back to their main objective.

"There was a fight," Harry admitted finally, closing in eyes in remembrance.

"Yeah?" One of the twins said, prompting him to continue.

"Ron had nearly choked Draco Malfoy to death in class, while Snape was briefly in his office getting something. After class then, while Snape was taking Malfoy to the Infirmary, I saw Ron and Zabini standing in the back, just laughing it up. It pissed me off, so I went back there and told him so and why." Harry said, pausing to take a deep breath, trying to remember just how it had started.

Abruptly, he found himself remembering the flying chair and Neville's shouted warning to him only seconds before. He remembered Ron laughing at him as he fought to keep from getting brained by it. And then, he remembered hurling himself at his infuriating friend, intent on pounding some sense into him.

He hadn't even told Snape about all of that, because the man hadn't asked him any more than just the names of his-.

 _Of my attackers_ , Harry thought painfully.

"Zabini started the fight by levitating projectiles and tossing them at my head with his wand." Harry said slowly, still lost in the strength of his recollections.

"Projectiles?" One of the twins asked hesitantly.

"The chairs," Neville clarified.

 _Thanks Neville_ , he said in his head, mentally thanking the other boy for being succinct with his clarification of Harry's account.

"Neville yelled out a warning to me, allowing me to dive out of the way safely." Harry said, pausing as the twins jumped up, and energetically clapped his friend on the back in congratulations. Harry waited until they sat back down again to continue.

"While I was on the floor, Ron started laughing at me, saying something about my cleaning the floor with my scuffling."

"Zabini was still tossing chairs at this point too," Neville said, adding on to his story in the lull created while Harry took a much needed breath.

His ribs, although technically healed, were still rather sore. He rather hoped that the twins didn't start heartily pounding him on the back as well; he wasn't sure if he could handle that.

"True," Harry said, when the boy had said his piece.

"My brother is such a jerk sometimes," Ginny said apologetically.

"Yeah well, what had set all of this off to begin with was my getting angry with him for laughing at Draco after almost killing him with his bare hands. Hearing him laugh at me then, all because I was trying to keep my head in one piece, well that made me pretty mad."

"So you kicked his arse," George—he was almost positive that it was George—said nonchalantly.

"We would have done the same thing," Fred said, sounding very serious all of a sudden—a phenomenon that made Harry suddenly extremely wary about being so close to the mischievous set of twins; he knew that they were rarely serious, except when trying to get away with something.

Percy, noticing Harry's sudden change in attitude, quickly put two and two together and grinned at him knowingly.

"Occasionally they do find cause to become serious," the older boy said solemnly. "Mind, usually it's while they're asleep, but—," he broke off as the twins attacked him, obviously trying to tickle him into submission.

"Oy! Geroff!" He shouted breathlessly out, suddenly strongly reminding Harry of how Ron generally sounded when attacked likewise. It made him hurt all over as he wondered what was going on with his friend.

Finally though, they let up and Percy was sitting upright once more, only now he was glaring in exasperation at his two younger brothers for their childish behavior in causing his hair to be mussed. Harry, who was permanently cursed with mussed hair, couldn't really see the issue with that, but then again, everyone knew that Percy was a different sort altogether.

Beside him, Ginny rolled her eyes at all of their supposed inane tendencies. Harry didn't mind it so much though, because even when they were annoyed with each other, they always seemed to work things out again.

 _Plus,_ he thought seriously to himself, _whenever one is in trouble, they all seem to come together as a family in response._ The obviously loving environment that pervaded their home, and their interactions as well, made him ache with secret longing for that kind of existence. He snuck a glance at Neville, who was sitting on the couch with a wishful expression on his face, likely for the same reasons.

Neville was no orphan and seemed to have a great deal of family around him, but there was still an unspoken sadness around the fact that he had been raised by only his Gran, and not his parents. From time to time, Harry found himself wondering what had happened to them, but as of yet had not asked the other boy about it.

"So," Harry said, suddenly desperate to finish the story and get away from them all by passing out in his much missed bed.

They looked at him intently, and Ginny nodded quietly at him to continue where he had left off.

"I went to hit him and Zabini tossed another chair at my head for my effort. Neville?" He said, turning to the other boy to allow him his piece of the story.

"Huh?" The boy answered, obviously caught off guard. "Oh, right. I saw Zabini throwing all those chairs and suddenly thought to myself that it might save us, especially Harry really, a lot of trouble if he didn't have to keep ducking chairs. Plus," the boy said nervously, "I thought he might eventually get lucky, and then Harry would seriously get hurt." He said, turning red and ducking behind a cushion.

Harry grinned and patted the boy on his shoulder, showing that he appreciated the thought.

Neville poked his head back out, and upon catching Harry's grin, smiled hesitantly back as well before completely his bit.

"So then I remembered me a spell that my Gran used to use on me when I was just a little'un, when she was tired of my making trouble for her. She'd just extinguish all of the lights with this spell and then wait in the dark until I got the message."

"What was the spell?" Harry asked, intrigued.

" _Pan Nox_ ," the other boy answered proudly.

"Makes sense," Percy said quietly.

"Well it most definitely worked," Harry said, nodding again at the boy.

"So, with the lights out, Zabini just tossed one more chair at where I had been. Ron and Harry were moving around, but I had been pretty well camped out behind a table. Apparently Zabini's memory is pretty sharp, because he pegged me directly, dropping it in just perfectly. Hurt like hell." Neville said, reveling in the shock on his friend's faces at his use of a semi-curse word.

"But you said before that you could still hear Harry's voice?" Ginny asked then, somewhat unsure sounding.

"I wasn't knocked unconscious, but I did get pretty woozy. When I tried to stand up, my knees buckled and I dropped like that," the boy said, snapping his fingers smartly.

"Why did you try to get up at all then?" Ginny asked, obviously annoyed at his apparent idiocy.

"Ah well—," Neville said, uncomfortably pulling at the collar of his shirt, even though it was just an old sleep shirt. He looked at Harry, obviously unsure about going on. Harry gave him a terse nod at his unspoken question.

"See," Neville said, turning bright red again. He looked down at his hands nervously, licking his lips a bit.

"I got up, because I thought that Harry might need help," he said quietly, as though ashamed.

"From Ron?" Fred inquired incredulously.

"He was hollering," Neville said, very uncomfortably, visibly edging away from them all.

Harry decided that it was time to relieve him of his discomfort.

"It was probably more like screaming, actually," Harry admitted lightly, shrugging.

"But—," Ginny said, not finishing her statement and biting her lip instead.

"Let him finish Ginny," Percy said quietly to his little sister.

And so, with a quavering breath, Harry laid it out for them.

When the lights had gone out, he had seen something that had pretty well freaked him out. Automatically his body had snapped into flight mode, and he had tried to get away just by backing up wildly on his hands and feet, bum sweeping the ground and all.

Ron had looked at him like a demon out of one of his nightmares. His eyes were glowing bright florescent green, and in that moment he had realized that whatever was going on wasn't something that they could just talk out, like usual.

He'd jumped as he'd heard the telltale sounds of a chair hitting yet another surface, followed by a groan of pain that he now knew had come from Neville.

He had only looked away from Ron's eyes for a moment, but the next thing he knew, Ron was right on top of him, wildly pounding his face with the broken leg of a chair.

Harry stopped his recounting of the story to look at Neville, who had begun shaking beside him.

"The way he laughed—," Harry said, his voice quavering a bit as well.

"It was really freaky." Neville said, pulling in a shuddery breath at the memory.

"It was unreal," Harry said, rubbing his hands through his hair as though trying to wipe the memory away from his mind. He was resolutely _not_ looking at the Weasleys, because he didn't want to see their horror or shock, or whatever their reactions would be to his crazy story. Therefore, he plunged back into the story itself instead of waiting for one of them to prompt him again.

He told them about his shriek when Ron hit him so hard that he thought his nose had detached from his face. He told them about instinctually trying to hide, to get away him and his impromptu bat. He told them about what it had felt like when Ron had apparently foregone the bat and started kicking him completely at will in his sides, cracking two ribs in the process.

He was willing to tell them all of that, and yet there were still things that he held back from saying.

Ron had finally stopped his physical attack on him after apparently realizing that Harry was barely conscious enough spit blood out of his mouth, let alone hit back. He told them that, but what he didn't say was the feeling of Ron leaning over to caress and knead his flaccid penis through his blood soaked pants. He didn't tell them how Ron had then licked his ear and then whispered to him about what a 'pretty young thing he was.' He didn't tell them that he had seen Ron and Zabini kiss out their way out the door, where a little light from the hallway had silhouetted their figures permanently in his mind's eye.

He didn't tell them that he heard them beginning to laugh again as they raced down the hallway—hand in hand—as he slipped into unconsciousness.

But as he could tell, when he opened his eyes from those awful memories, that what he had told them had been a little too much even so. They looked shell shocked and for the most part, were all staring uncomprehendingly at him. Next to him, Neville sat with his head in his hands, crying softly, leaving Harry to wonder if he had witnessed any of the stuff that Harry had _not_ spoken about.

Harry felt like crying too, but thought that he would be better off doing so in his own bed. He somehow managed to find the strength to stagger up and off of the couch, and make it up the stairs before collapsing on his bed with a sharp pain filled intake of breath at doing so.

As he dropped heavily into the hard sleep of the weary, he realized that he had not set the silencing spell on his bed before doing so. However, his body no longer gave a damn as it slipped away from the waking world with barely another twitch.

It hadn't even occurred to him that he had forgotten to take off his shoes.

…

In an unfamiliar room, a very messed up and worn out Ron Weasley blearily opened his eyes. He thought that he had been asleep, but wasn't very sure he could altogether trust his memory. He thought he had dreamed something about a fight of some kind, followed by his being very amused by something wildly ridiculous.

 _Maybe the two memories are related_ , he thought in a very muddled sort of way.

He couldn't remember where he was, what day it was, when he had last eaten, or where his pants were. Of all of those issues, the last one was the only one that actually seemed to be a bit of a pressing concern to him.

He had quickly realized he was nude, shortly after opening his eyes and looking down, but what he didn't realize was the extremely haggard condition of his body itself. Anyone else would have been able to see the scores of bite marks up and down his torso and limbs, just from glancing at him. Furthermore, upon closer inspection, they would have clearly seen that the bite marks were definitely from at least five different people, if not more. Some of the bites had viciously torn into the skin of his young supple flesh; leaving jagged bruises, welts and gashes in him, most of which were tinged brightly with his own dried blood.

However, he felt virtually none of this upon waking; nor did he feel the painful ache of his empty stomach vying for attention with his very full bladder. He looked over to the left of him and found the dark smooth skin of Blaise peeking out from beneath a blue knit blanket. The sight of the boy made something surge in him, and he reached out for the boy without another thought, quickly setting himself to work on the other boy's taut nipples with his mouth.

Soon they were both moaning their pleasure against one another's equally battered bodies. The older boys sat around them watching in silence, knowing that they needed to be given food and water before another go around. Most of the boys' bodies were littered with healed over scars that were very similar in appearance to those that Ron was sporting currently.

The ring of gaunt, hard looking boys did not eat or drink because they felt the need or desire for such objects, but rather because it was required in order to stay conscious enough to fuck. As Blaise and Ron had figured out earlier, it was solely the question of either being the fucker or the fucked. As long as they remembered to eat and drink occasionally, they could continue to do what they wanted. They even had blood replenishing potions on hand to use on those who passed out from too much blood loss.

For most of the boys in the room, school was no longer a concept that had any meaning attached to it. They were little better than a whorehouse, really. Older men would drop by occasionally, take what they want, and then leave, settling their payments with the man behind the scenes.

All throughout the circle, the boys sat grouped in sets of two, a magically created length of chain binding the two together at the ankle. It expanded in length when they needed it to, and then contracted when they didn't. The chain was only superfluous really, since the pairs could not survive for very long in the absence of their partners. It was almost as though one joint mind controlled the two different bodies.

Another important detail that Ron had not noticied was the thin trickle of blood that had dried against the back of his thighs from the energetic qualities of those around him in the previous two days. They used lubrication, even a special kind with a healing salve built in, but even that had not completely stopped the drive of the Fless driven fucking against the mostly virgin arse.

The room was fairly large, but dank and shut off from the rest of the world. There were no windows in its walls, no obvious entries in or out, and no time pieces present. The floor was covered in self-cleaning mattresses and a few blankets here and there. On the far wall, next to one of the rarely used lavatories, someone had written—likely in blood—that Fless = Flesh in fairly large and jagged letters.

Although the author of that message was now rather dead—and his body hidden—the truth of the message was still alive.

It was something that Blaise and Ron would be taking to heart soon enough.


	19. Cause for Exhaustion

Severus Snape was exhausted.

Draco Malfoy was missing and Lucius didn't seem to care. The man was not particularly skilled at occluding his mind, and Severus had taken advantage of that fact when he had notified the pompous twig about his son.

Lucius Malfoy did not know where his son was, nor did he give a damn. In fact, the overriding feeling that Severus had gotten from his mind, in regards to the boy in question, was an overwhelming sense of relief at not having to deal with the situation anymore.

It was common for many of the students in Slytherin to have come from less than optimal home situations. He was intimately familiar with the living conditions of such a home. It was therefore typical, if not altogether normal, for there to be a higher than average rate of dropouts within the Slytherin house itself.

Until recently, the problem was fueled primarily by runaways. Lately however, something had been different, and it had begun bothering Severus deeply.

 _Less than optimal,_ he thought sourly to himself; _Merlin,_ howhe hated that phrase.

It had been tossed out to him by Albus, when he had been a student at Hogwarts himself. He had pleaded with the old man not to send him back to his tyrannical father and his twisted methods for enforcing discipline within his household.

Dumbledore, old as sin even when he was a boy, had fumbled around the issue for more than two terms before finally being forced by Severus to give a decision regarding his situation. It had quickly became apparent that Albus had been raised in one of those perfect, traditional little two parent households, where the rules were in place to protect the children, and where the punishments meted always fit the crimes.

Lucius had understood his problems far better than this so-called genius of a headmaster. Lucius's had two parents who lived in the same house as one another, but that was where the fairy tale ended for him. The majority of Lucius's memories about his old man involved his being secluded away in the back bedroom, as he "entertained" the local orphan children of the neighboring villages.

Severus, knowing far too well about that sort of thing, thanks to his own lecherous father, had been sickened by the description that Lucius had painted for him. Lucius had gone on to say that of his two parents, he actually despised his mother more for just standing by and not doing anything to stop it.

After all, there were some days that his father, who was usually drunk or jacked up on something—often muggle made, Lucius would sneer—that he had used Lucius for his games, not even remembering that the boy was his own son.

The man who was Lucius's father had gone on to die surprisingly early, shortly after the Christmas holidays the year of Lucius's fifth year—Severus's fourth. Severus had never asked, but he had always strongly suspected that Lucius been involved in ending his old man's life.

Severus shook his head, trying to wrench himself free from the troubling memories of his past, and focus once more on the issue at hand.

In the past, the probable runaways had been males _and_ females alike who had gone to bed at night, only to have been reported as missing the next morning. Furthermore, most of the students who vanished were the types who had gotten themselves into trouble of some sort, usually related to grades, although that wasn't always the case. Moreover, the missing students tended to have no external ties to the outside world, other than a family that had treated them like slop all of their lives in those damnable ' _less than optimal'_ conditions.

Severus gritted his teeth, not allowing himself to be sucked down once more. What was done was done; there was no changing the sordid situations that he had been raised in.

The numbers of disappearing students as of late had increased by the slightest of margins. However, the students that were disappearing were almost all males. In addition, although some of the students that had gone missing were students whose grades had been fairly dismal, there were also a good many average ranked students, if not better. Likewise, not all of the recently missing students had families that didn't give a damn whether they lived or died.

That was where the orchestrators of this scheme had really effed up, as far as he was concerned. It was likely that they had gotten greedy, but he had no way of proving that to anyone beyond just a gut instinct. He had been forced to rely heavily on his gut instincts when he was a spy, and therefore knew that his instincts rarely led him astray.

Earlier that Saturday, at lunchtime, he had been informed by Minerva that the youngest Weasley boy seemed to be missing from Gryffindor. The last time he had been seen in the tower was early that previous Thursday morning, when he had left with Potter and Granger to go to breakfast.

She was reluctant to declare him as missing however, given the family's tendency towards overreacting to less than worrisome news.

"I certainly don't envy you the position of informing Molly Weasley about anything," he had said to her, honestly thankful to be free of _that_ particular burden. Truthfully, many of the parents of the children in his house were not precisely _pleasant_ to deal with either, but that was a consistency for them, no matter what the situation. However, Molly Weasley was a force of her own, and he knew better than to idly get her ire up.

"I trust that Potter made it back to the tower this morning after being released by Poppy?" He asked, knowing all too well that Minerva would likely see through his attempt at casually questioning her about the boy.

But perhaps the missing Weasley child was more worrisome than she had let on, for she only shot him a surprised glance before confirming that the fat lady had seen him earlier that morning.

"He also hasn't left either," she said, primly buttering a roll without managing to get butter on her fingers. He had never quite figured out how she did that, but decided that it was below him and far too preposterous a subject to ask her about.

And that had been that. He had not deigned to tell her that the Slytherin boy whom the Weasley boy had last been seen with was _also_ missing. Zabini was a smart boy who regularly did just barely enough to get by, and his potions class was no exception. He had seen Zabini talking to Weasley more than a couple of times in the hallways, primarily around mealtimes, but had not yet investigated the situation.

While it was true that his Slytherins did frequently stick around each other, there were still a number of inter-house friendships, from first years to seventh. The number was probably lower than other houses, but since he had never really investigated the issue, he had no basis of fact to support that claim.

However, one thing that he did know was that those inter-house relationships rarely, if ever, existed between Slytherin and Gryffindor. In fact, the prefects and head boy and girl were under strict orders to inform him immediately if such a thing ever occurred. He had let them know that while such relationships weren't banned, they weren't particularly safe either—for either side. If such a thing were to exist, he did not want anyone, especially one of his snakes, to be accidentally caught in the crossfire.

His mind drifted back to the Potter boy. He hoped that the child was doing something productive with his time, even if he was just sleeping. The boy had clearly slept better in his presence, but better was largely a relative concept. The child had thrashed hard enough to wake him up more than once in those various nights that he had spent in his presence. While it was likely that the boy had nightmares about Lucius, it was also infinitely possible that his relatives had provided him with more than enough fodder to fill his subconscious for eons to come.

He had to admit that he was surprised that Minerva hadn't seemed aware of Potter's sleep difficulties. If Potter had been placed in his house, he would have seen to it that the boy had gotten someone, himself if necessary, to talk to. And if that had not worked, for whatever reason or reasons, then he would have made sure that the child was given a good supply of dreamless sleep, just to fight against the exhaustion that likely plagued the boy.

Severus was sorely tempted to make arrangements for Harry to sleep a few nights in his private rooms; if nothing else, then at least for the sake of observation to determine if there was some kind of pattern associated with the dreams. Given the boy's innate connection to the Dark Lord, it was possible, if not likely, that his dreaming mind might hold some clue to the bastard's movements. The incident the previous year with Quirrell and the Philosopher's Stone had been a little too close to bear comfortably. In addition, he knew that Poppy and many of the other professors had felt the same. Dumbledore, however, had been less than helpful in doing anything about their concerns.

 _Of course, that was not a surprise,_ he thought bitterly, his mind falling back onto those damned _less than optimal_ conditions once more.

He needed to go see Poppy. He was thinking in circles. He knew that she would set him straight. After all, she always had.

…

Poppy was not surprised to see Severus skulk into her domain once more. It seemed that as of late, he was incapable of leaving her for more than a few days without something going wrong. She didn't mind the visits though. It was nice that he was finally opening up enough to trust another with his problems, even if it _was_ the 'dragon lady' that he was choosing to speak with.

Given the proximity of certain other patients of hers, she decided to give him a cover for his being there, regardless of whether he wanted one or not. After all, he deserved it for his smacking her on the rump, a few days prior.

"Ah Severus," she exclaimed brightly, as his eyes narrowed warily at her, obviously waiting for the punch line. "You're just in time for your yearly physical."

She watched in amusement as the tips of his ears turned pink, and he shot threatening glares around the room, silently threatening those who were there with death—or worse—should they make any remark about her statement.

"Follow me," she said, turning gaily back to her office, leaving him walk murderously behind her.

When they were safely ensconced behind her door, he turned to her and glared for a moment before speaking.

"Why do you do that?" He complained to her, obviously annoyed.

"Ah, I think you left something out of your initial question there, dear." She said mischievously.

He raised an eyebrow at her, but did not follow her down into her obvious trap.

"The question you should be asking is rather, 'why do you do that to _me?_ '" she said, grinning brightly at his scowling face.

He crossed his arms and frowned, before lightening up a bit by sticking his tongue out at her for a brief moment.

"There," he said, nodding his head as though he had just made a significant point.

"There what?" She asked, still amused at his unusual antics.

"I think I've made my point." He said, sniffing disdainfully in her direction.

They stared at each other a few moments more before she laughed in delight at him. He responded by smirking at her in wry amusement.

"Besides," she said, wiggling her eyebrows at him, "how else can I be expected to ever see your bulging chest muscles?" She snorted at herself, completely undone by her own daring in asking such a ridiculous thing of such a somber young man.

"Honestly, if you think I have bulging chest muscles, then you need to get away from doing physicals with old professors," he said, taking her comment in stride, surprisingly enough, given his usual temperament.

"I know what you're thinking, young man," she said, shaking a finger at him, "and let me tell you this—we are _not_ even going to go there, let alone discuss it." She said, trying to make him think she was more disturbed than amused by his statement.

"I believe that you were initially responsible for bringing the disconcerting subject up," he said, raising his hands in innocence, and looking at her pointedly. "Although," he said, continuing on calmly, "I doubt that there is very little 'up' involved for most of them," he said, allowing a smirk to grace his features once more at the look of her utterly gobsmacked expression.

She quickly recovered her composure and slapped him on the knee for his impudence.

"I see that Mr. Potter has not been injured yet again in your presence," she said, abruptly changing the subject away from the very alarming one that they had previously been speaking on.

 _Or around, rather_ , she thought, keeping her amusement firmly in check that time.

"As far as I am aware—not as of yet," Severus answered her a bit stiffly.

"Oh, I thought that I might mention to you an idea I had towards keeping an eye on him without being around him constantly," she said, keeping her voice purposely casual. She was interested in his reaction to her statement.

"Indeed." He said, eyeing her curiously.

She noted with approval that he did not deny his interest in the boy's welfare.

"I suppose that I might have done better to mention this to you earlier, but you slipped out without saying goodbye," she trailed off, letting her annoyance with him creep a bit into her voice.

"You could have asked Harry," he answered, shifting uncomfortably in his seat at her unspoken disapproval.

"Well, that's something at least," she said, only somewhat appeased. "I daresay that had you left without telling the boy, he would have been somewhat displeased with you."

"I thought likewise," he said in acquiescence, obviously trying to sound casual about the growing relationship that was developing between them.

"Must I warn you of the consequences of betraying him, especially now?" She said, dropping all amusement from her countenance and looking steadily at him as she waited for his reply.

"I am quite aware that they would be most dire, especially when one takes into account how often he has been betrayed by the adults in his life up until now." He said, answering seriously, while staring at her with something akin to both determination and fury in his dark eyes.

He leaned forwards suddenly, breaking from his usually impeccable posture, and put his arms on his knees as he gazed intently at the smaller woman before him.

"I promised him that I would protect him from whoever might hurt him." He informed her very softly; making her aware of the level of devotion he already had towards the boy.

"Then I don't think that you'll mind my taking his welfare concerns into my hands, as it were." She said, looking intently into his eyes.

He straightened back up, looking more relaxed than he had prior to his admission.

"I must admit that I am interested in this scheme of yours," he said, leaning back a bit and crossing his long legs in front of him casually.

"I thought as much," she said, nodding knowingly at him.

And so, she showed him what she had finally decided to do. She had charmed a simple silver chain necklace to silently alert its wearer towards any extreme distress that was currently being experienced by the boy. She had done this by making a copy of Harry's magical signature and binding it into the links themselves. Since she had recorded a copy of his unique magical code when the boy had been sleeping on Severus's chest a couple of nights before, she felt that the magic in the charm might work best when worn by Severus.

"Do you have the necklace then?" He asked, obviously intrigued by the possibilities of such a device.

"Yes," she said answered, unwrapping the charmed jewelry from where she had wound it onto her wrist and handing it to him.

He carefully linked its ends behind his neck and then looked at her. Almost immediately, his gaze unfocused as a strange look came over his face.

"Did you hear a high pitched sound while you were wearing the chain?" He asked, after a second or two more of disconcerting silence.

"No," she said worriedly, peering questioningly into his face.

Suddenly his eyes went wide and he jumped up, cursing just under his breath, before striding quickly out of her office.

"I must make use of your floo, Poppy," he said over his shoulder, before picking up speed in his stride. Once there, he quickly flung in the floo powder and was gone before she even had a chance to close her mouth.

…

Neville was worried about Harry. Secretly he wondered if Harry had told the entire story about what had happened there in the dark of the dungeons on that awful day. By the time the attack had occurred, he had become less than a veritable witness of anything, given his concussion, but he still thought that he had heard something else there in the silence following Harry's brutal beating.

He thought he had heard anguished whimpering coming from the other boy before he had heard Ron and Zabini leave. But it wasn't really the sort of thing he felt he could just casually ask his friend, especially given how wan Harry still looked following his recounting of the events in that classroom.

So he had left the other boy alone to sleep and recover as long as he could there in the safety of their room.

It was a quiet weekend day that was ultimately not to last. Neville had been watching the snow fall silently outside the common room window when he had first heard the sound. It was a scary sound as sounds go, but even more disturbing was the fact that he had _recognized_ the sound. It was a low, harsh moan that had only begun building in volume and range the longer it continued on.

Given that Harry was the only one currently in their dorm room, Neville made the guess that it was probably coming from him. After all, he had been responsible for the sound when it had occurred before, at the beginning of the term.

Quickly, he mounted the steps and made it across the room in hopes of perhaps providing Harry with some much needed comfort—and failing that, at least hoping to be able to wake the boy up.

However, it was not to be.

As soon Neville got to Harry's bed, Harry had started shrieking in what sounded like absolute terror. He was curled up into the fetal position at the head of his bed. Neville noticed that he must have forgotten to take off his shoes, although he had at least removed his glasses. One of his shoes was sitting by itself in the middle of his wrecked covered, while the other was still firmly attached to his foot.

In-between the sounds of the shrieking, Neville could hear Harry saying other things too, like 'no' and 'please don't.'

"Come on Harry," he said, unsure of whether it would do any good to touch his friend now.

Harry shrieked again in response to whatever was going on in his nightmare. This time however, he didn't leave it with that. He started beating his arms on the sturdy headboard, obviously trying to break out of something in the dream.

Neville had to do something before Harry beat himself bloody. The strikes were picking up in intensity and he had begun beating the back of his head against the headboard as well, almost perfectly in time with his arms.

"Harry!" The smaller boy yelled, grabbing his friend and trying to shake him out of it.

As it turned out, this was a bad idea.

Neville wasn't sure exactly how Harry managed to do it, but shortly after touching him, the smaller boy found himself in midair, hurtling backwards from Harry's bed, before being caught by the far wall with a hard THWAP that left him bruised and unconscious for the second time in as many days.

…

Severus jumped out of the floo in the Gryffindor dorm in a way reminiscent of the way that he had gone in on the infirmary side. Luckily there were only a few children present in the common room; otherwise he feared that it would have been more difficult to make it across the room as quickly as he did. He didn't need to ask where Harry was; thanks to the necklace, it was more than clear to him that he was in his bed.

He quickly made it to the door, going inside hastily, fearing what he might find. As he strode in, his eyes fell on the rather familiar form of the Longbottom boy, unconscious on the floor, a deep purple welt swelling up on his brow. Noticing that the boy was in fact breathing, he did not step to check on the child, but instead headed further into the room, identifying that the source of the shrieking was indeed coming from Harry.

Closer inspection of the boy revealed lacerations and welts running up and down his arms that were obviously self-inflicted as Harry continued throwing himself upon the now bloodied headboard. Like Neville, Severus also made the clear assumption that the boy was trapped somehow within his dream, reduced to fighting wildly in both locales, desperate to remove himself.

Severus called his name several times, but got no response and decided to take the chance of touching the boy, even though the chances were high that he would end up like Neville. He only hoped that should that occur, he would at least have the wherewithal not to be unduly knocked out.

As soon as his fingertips touched the marred skin of the boy's forearm, he knew that it was not going to end well, given the accompanying crackle of magic that he felt reverberate throughout his body.

This time, Harry's wild magic reacted even more strongly, as it threw Harry up and away at the same time that it threw Severus backwards—hard—onto the floor.

He ignored the pain of the welts he could feel raising under his clothes as he pushed desperately up from the ground. Halfway towards standing, he heard the horrific telltale sounds of breaking glass and realized that the child had broken his way through the window and would be killed if he did not find a way to save him.

"NO!" He called out in anguish, hardly aware that he had done so. Then, using his arms to pull himself nearly all of the way over the headboard, he threw his head out the window, only to see a small figure falling frightfully fast towards the hard snow covered ground below.

He knew that there were wards protecting the students from this sort of thing, but it was quite obvious that Harry broken through them. His wand was already in his hand when he cast his spell towards the boy.

" _ACCIO_ HARRY POTTER," he yelled out the window, startling half a dozen birds from where they had been perched just below the windowsill.

He poured all of strength into the command, visually imagining what he wanted in his mind as his old charms instructor had suggested for particularly difficult situations. Not only was he fighting gravity, but he was fighting the unusual strength of a second year's wild magic.

He could still feel Harry's terror through the link he had with him via the necklace, which he was now fingering nervously as he waited for his spell to make some kind of obvious effect on the boy.

Then, through the cold blowing snow that had begun again, shortly after Harry's fall, he saw a small figure zooming towards him at near breakneck speed. He quickly set a cushioning spell around him as the boy's body came directly into view. Even _with_ the spell, his nearly frozen body thumped into his chest hard enough to leave bruises on them both, as well as push Severus backwards onto the mattress behind him.

He didn't care. The violently trembling child was now wrapped in his arms tightly, and he was damned if he was going to allow something like that to ever occur again.

As he carefully gathered the boy into his chest and stood up, he noticed the boy's glasses sitting on his nightstand and pocketed them as well. The boy was staring up at him and he was once again reminded of the young primate being held tightly in its parents protective arms.

"I told you I would not allow you to be hurt, did I not?" He said softly to the small bundle in his arms.

Harry nodded his head, far more amazed by having an adult keep his word than having just nearly fallen to his death.

From outside the protective circle of his arms, he heard someone whisper, and he looked up in annoyance at having witnesses to his acting anything other than a snarky bastard.

"Well done sir," Fred said in amazement to his actions in saving Harry's life.

Severus realized that the entire contingent of school-bound Weasleys—minus Ron—was standing at the doorway with frightened, yet astounded looks on their faces.

He chose not to speak and instead walked through their throng with nary a glance at any of them. At the doorway, a thought struck him, and so he turned around and silently repaired the broken window. Then, looking at the oldest of the redheaded ones, he spoke.

"I trust that you will find it feasible to take young Mr. Longbottom down to the infirmary as soon as possible, yes?" He said, cocking an eyebrow at the lad.

"Yes sir." Percy answered crisply to the professor whom had just miraculously saved Harry Potter's life.

"Very well," Severus said, nodding once at the lad, before turning and heading out the door.

He carried Harry down the steps and then went back through the Floo once more, being especially careful this time in direct accordance to the precious bundle that he was now carrying in his arms.


	20. Bedlam

Late in that same afternoon, Minerva found herself standing in the Gryffindor common room—or what could also laughingly be referred to as "bedlam"—shortly after the occurrence of the "most spectacular thing we've ever seen," according to the Weasley twins, whom she had passed by in the hallway, carrying a dreadful looking Neville Longbottom between them, apparently on their way to the infirmary.

Apparently, the Weasleys had witnessed the majority of the event, to the exclusion of the other students, minus the unfortunate Longbottom, who had been knocked out by the time they'd gotten involved.

"We heard this crashing sound, and so we all ran up to look, you know?" Percy said, trying to keep his excitement under control now in the presence of their head of house.

"Go on," she said, caught somewhere between fearful and annoyed that Severus Snape been involved in the internal affairs of _her_ house.

"And there he was—," Percy said, before she cut him off in annoyance.

"There _who_ was, Mr. Weasley?" She asked, irritated at his ambiguous description.

"Oh, Professor Snape o' course!" He answered with awe still evident on his freckled face.

"Go on please." She said tersely.

"Well he—Professor Snape—was up straddling the headboard and he was leaning out so far, I thought that he was certainly done for, you know ma'am?" He looked brightly up at her, before continuing on, obviously not expecting her to respond.

"And he yelled 'ACCIO HARRY POTTER,' in this great big booming voice. His eyes were all wild too, ma'am. I mean, I don't mean any disrespect, but he looked rather, ah, _intense_ , I'd say." He told her excitedly, nodding his head so vigorously she feared he might lose it before getting to the end of the story.

"And?" She asked calmly.

"Well, then nothing happened, not at first anyways. We were all holding our breaths, weren't we Gin?" He said, glancing at his sister, who nodded at him in agreement.

Minerva noticed that her small face was rather white with near shock, and thought that it might be best for her to lie down after this was all said and done. She would tell her so at the end of the conversation, provided she ever reached such a thing.

"And then Professor Snape, well he looked out and his face brightened up a bit and we figured that meant that the spell was working. We heard him whisper another spell, I think it was a cushioning spell of some sort, personally, and then we saw Harry fly into him from outside the window. He hit Professor Snape in the chest hard enough to knock them both backwards, but luckily the bed broke their fall, unlike with Neville." Percy stopped, smiling up at her proudly.

"That's the account then?" She asked him, trying to keep the weariness from being too evident in her voice.

"Yes ma'am," he said, starting to nod his vigorously once more.

She had to give him an assignment before he drove her completely nuts. Quickly, she gave him a rundown of the usual inter-house loyalty, etc. speech, and then instructed him not to let the rumors fly too much around the common room.

 _Like he can even possibly hope to do anything against rumors of_ this _caliber,_ she thought dourly.

On her way out, she spoke delicately with the youngest Weasley, mentioning her concern to the girl at having witnessed such an emotionally fraught thing. She pointed out that it would not be remiss for the young girl to go to sleep a bit earlier that evening.

The girl nodded once, obviously having picked up on Minerva's growing annoyance with her older brother's idiotic head waggling.

She was turning to go when a small hand touched her arm.

Minerva turned to see the child standing and looking expectantly up at her.

"Child, is there something else you wish to say?" She asked gently.

"Percy didn't mention the bit at the end," the girl said, nearly whispering.

"Oh?"

"After Professor Snape stood up, and he had Harry in his arms, he leaned his head down and said something like, 'see? I told you I'd protect you,' or something like that. He said it really quietly, but Harry knew what he was talking about, 'cause he nodded real seriously afterwards." She said, looking altogether far too grave for the eleven year old that she was.

"Thank for telling me this Ginny," she said, remembering her name at the last second and adding it for emphasis.

The child nodded solemnly once more and then turned around, presumably heading to her bed to do as her head of house had instructed.

Minerva found herself watching the child for a moment longer than necessary, before turning around and exiting the portrait hole carefully.

…

"Need I tell you that you are one of my most frequently reoccurring patients, Mr. Potter?" Poppy said upon seeing a shivering and bloodied boy in the arms of Severus upon their simultaneous exit from the floo.

It worried her that he did not respond to her words, but instead continued to shiver and stare steadily up into the face of the man whose arms were still wrapped tightly around him, even now.

"Severus?" She asked the unusually pale faced man who was currently heading towards the bed in the far corner that she had begun thinking permanently of as "Harry's bed."

Severus climbed on the bed carefully, his arms full of the injured child who was still staring at him intensely. Poppy noticed that the boy had one mangled claw of a hand tightly fisted in the dark material of the man's robes. She also was honestly amazed that the boy was conscious at all, given the amount of blood and bruising that was evident around just the crown of his head.

Severus looked up at her, shaking his head ever so imperceptibly at her unspoken question, before looking back down again.

"Harry had a bit of a nightmare," he said, speaking very slowly and gently, as he worked not to frighten the child into any more undue harm.

When she walked up closer to the boy, she was sad to see him whimper a bit and pull himself farther back into the protective cradle of Severus's arms.

"Can you run your diagnostic tests from where you were standing a minute ago?" He asked her, not unkindly, obviously not daring to remove his eyes from the still terrified and traumatized boy who had decided, for whatever reason, to trust him with his protection.

"Of course," she answered smoothly, as though this were a common practice of hers.

While she casting her spells, the Weasley twins made their entrance, carrying between them the Longbottom boy, who was unconscious, once more. She excused herself and walked over to her newest patient. She noted with further inspection, that the boy had also sustained some rather impressive bruises up and down his back, as well upon the side of his brow.

After thanking the twins kindly, she changed him into the standard pajamas, and set him upon his stomach, so as not to further aggravate the pain of the bruises. She also cleaned him up and spelled some pain potion directly into his stomach, followed by some dreamless sleep. If this boy had witnessed any of what had happened with Harry, then it was likely that he would soon be having nightmares as well.

With that done, she walked back behind the curtains to where Severus was sitting with his arms still around the boy.

The boy's eyes were now closed and he appeared to be asleep, but not wanting to take any chances, she stopped at the foot of the bed with a questioning look on her face to Severus before continuing. He looked up and nodded silently, and she took the opportunity to quickly spell the same combination of potions into his stomach as she had just done with Neville.

From there, she cleaned the boy up and handed Severus some of his specially created bruise/healing salve to rub into the boy's arms and body. Together they worked on the child, her healing the broken bones in his fingers, while Severus treated his lacerations and welts.

Finally, the boy was clean, as well as could be currently expected, and was sporting the standard soft pajamas of the infirmary. Only in his case, she decided to tweak them a bit, by adding in a pattern of snitches trimmed in gold across the expanse of the top and bottom of the set.

Once that was done, she had surreptitiously set a silencing spell before turning and looking at Severus worriedly.

"Before you tell me—and you realize that you _will_ be telling me as much as you know," she said looking at him vehemently, "I need to know how you are."

"Other than being still terrified?" Severus asked, whispering even though her silencing spell was one of the strongest in the UK.

She watched him lean his head carefully back and close his eyes for a moment, obviously trying to gather his wits about him before speaking.

"Well, I can tell that your neck and back are paining you fairly significantly," she said, speaking in his silence.

"Especially if I can tell just by looking at your face," she pointed out seriously.

"I am not concerned with my pain," he said with his head still resting against the wall; she watched with interest as he didn't argue with her as she slipped a pillow carefully behind his head.

"Ah, but I am." She said smartly, thankfully long used to dealing with his poor patient behavior. She had discovered long ago that it was far better to treat him without saying anything about it while she was doing it. It was even better if she could trick him by distracting him while she focused on his health. Generally, the worse he felt, the easier the process was—for her.

As she had also learned long ago, guilt was a good distracter.

"After all," she point out solemnly, "what would happen to the boy if you were to suddenly disappear or become gravely injured?"

She watched quietly as a wave of pain flashed over his face at her words.

"He nearly died today," he said, avoiding her question.

She felt her insides go cold at his words, yet found herself unable to resist asking about it.

"I almost got there too late," he said while she quietly spelled some double strength pain potion into his stomach.

"You mentioned something about a nightmare when you first came in. I take it that Harry was the one having the nightmare. It must have been an extremely violent one, considering his physical condition upon your arrival."

"It seemed that he was trying to get out or away from something in his dream," Severus answered, the sorrow for the boy becoming clearer in his face as the pain from his back began to release.

"And Mr. Longbottom?" She asked.

"Likely tried to wake him by touching him," Severus said, opening his eyes finally and looking at her steadily. His eyes were bloodshot and clearly exhausted.

"And you came to this conclusion because of what evidence?" She asked him calmly.

"The fact that when I touched him for the same reason as Longbottom, his wild magic threw me backwards onto the floor hard enough that someone should consider checking and seeing if there's not an imprint of my body up there in the floorboards." He grimaced at the memory.

"And then," he said, continuing on, "upon standing, I heard glass breaking."

"Oh my," she said, raising a hand to her mouth in horror.

"I there just in time to see him falling past the outside of the window."

She didn't speak but laid a hand on his shoulder tenderly, furtively checking the muscles there as she did so.

He glanced at her hand with a knowing glance, but did not say anything.

"Tell me you didn't go out after him," she said worriedly.

"I very nearly did, actually." He said, closing his eyes again at the memory. "I climbed on top of his headboard and straddled it, with only a leg planted to keep me up there. Then I looked out and spotted his—his body f-falling," Severus said, falling silent.

It worried her to hear him speak so nervously about what almost had happened.

"I did the only thing I could think of," he said, sounding much younger, almost apologetic.

"It seemed to work, did it not?" She said, carefully smoothing his hair with her hand.

"Yes. I used the accio charm on him. When he came back through, he hit me hard enough to knock us both over backwards onto his mattress." Severus fell silent and she watched him calmly before deciding to direct some dreamless sleep into his stomach as well.

"Better make it double-strength," he said, far more aware of her methods than she had ever guessed.

She noted, with some annoyance, that he hadn't even needed to open his eyes to guess her plan. She must be getting too predictable.

She pulled off his boots gently before covering them up with the blanket and tucking it carefully in around them.

Before the dreamless sleep took effect, she kissed him lightly on the forehead, and was more than a little surprised to see a genuine smile appear on his face at her actions.

Then they were both unconscious, and she looked at her boys sadly, wondering silently about what would happen next.


	21. The Nameless Chapter

Minerva didn't go straight to the infirmary after leaving the Gryffindor tower. After all, how was she to know that Severus would still be there after all the time that had passed since the "incident" itself?

After waiting for what seemed like an interminable time outside the door of his quarters, she finally left and decided to go and talk to Poppy to see if she had any light to shed on the situation. By this point, she had missed dinner, so she stopped by the kitchens for a quick bite, which she was sure Poppy would appreciate, given her much improved mood afterwards.

As she walked, she thought back fondly to the days where she could easily just pop in to Albus's office for a real chat, where he actually offered real advice that generally made some sort of sense. That had been back before the deaths of Lily and James Potter though; a memory that caused her pain still to this day.

True, James had been a bit wild in his school years, but Lily had settled him down quickly. As Lily had told her in private, she aimed to make a man out of the boy, so to speak, and was determined that by hook or by crook, she would succeed in her ploy.

And truly, the last time that she had seen them, shortly before they had gone into hiding, James had seem much the changed man. He had been gracious, polite, courteous; Minerva had even asked Lily for the recipe when James had stepped out of the room to retrieve something for her. Lily had laughed at her request, before shaking her head and explaining that James was just like any other project she had worked on in school. She saw the problem and had thrown her all into the business of making things work.

Minerva had still been impressed nonetheless. She had told her quite frankly that she had been afraid things would end badly between the two of them sooner, rather than later.

Lily, for her part, hadn't looked surprised to hear that; in fact, she confided in her old professor that several of her friends had actually said much the same thing before the wedding itself, as though they thought they had a chance against overpowering the desires of Lily Evans.

Minerva hastily wiped a tear away upon reaching the door of the infirmary. It had continued to anger her that Harry had missed out on so much from the cruelties of Voldemort.

And Albus, he had been something else altogether. It was as though he had taken their deaths—their murders—as a personal affront to his own self-image. He hadn't been the same since, and as of late, the man who had been Albus Dumbledore had largely seemed to disappear from her world. As if the losses they had sustained hadn't been traumatic enough, now she was forced to watch one of her oldest, dearest friends, just drift away like a boat lost at sea.

She didn't bother to wipe her face too strenuously before seeking out Poppy. Poppy had always been able to determine how she was doing, no matter what her attempts at subterfuge. It was one of the most annoying and endearing qualities about the woman.

…

Late in the evening, Poppy saw Minerva come in to the infirmary looking harried and more than a little distressed. She watched as she looked around for someone, before finally looking directly at her with an unusually steely gaze.

There was no doubt in Poppy's mind that the issue had hand had something to do with Mr. Potter's presence here, but she doubted that was all there was to it. She knew from personal experience that Minerva's mind was capable of focusing on many issues at the same time, usually all dour and unpleasant.

"Have you seen Severus, Poppy?" The other woman asked her with an exasperated look on her face.

"You mean, recently?" Poppy asked sweetly.

"I must talk with him at once," Minerva said in a commanding voice.

"I'm sorry, but that's quite impossible," Poppy said, crossing her arms sternly, before looking carefully into the other woman's harried eyes. She was quite positive that something had driven the woman to tears, but she was not quite yet willing to find out what.

"Poppy!" Minerva said, her frustration bubbling over at her request being denied.

"He is rather indisposed," Poppy said, hoping that her explanation would be enough for Minerva to leave and then come back later, perhaps after a full night's sleep, if she was lucky.

"I suppose you have some knowledge of what happened earlier this afternoon in regards to Mr. Potter, yes?" She inquired haughtily to her old friend.

Poppy saw her eyes flit once over to where Longbottom lay, thick in the midst of the dreamless sleep she had administered him earlier.

"Poor dear," Poppy said, frowning in genuine sympathy over the state of the boy who was once again in her care.

"As his head of house, I should have been informed immediately about the situation at hand!" Minerva said, raising her voice a fraction of a decibel level.

"Hush dear," Poppy said needlessly, given the magically induced sleeping arrangements all of her patients were currently under. But then again, there was that lovely guilt tactic she was frequently forced to employ against some of her more _frisky_ visitors.

Minerva raised an eyebrow, but when she next spoke, her voice was indeed at a more manageable level.

"Fine. Now answer the question."

"The Weasley twins informed me that they had explained the basics to you; plus, upon his arrival here, Mr. Potter was," she thought for a good word, "rather _difficult_ to proceed with, given his high level of hysteria following the most extraordinary event that transpired around him."

_There, that was almost acceptable._

Minerva was pursing her lips irritably at her.

Poppy raised an eyebrow of her own in challenge.

"Oh fine," Minerva said, raising her hands in helpless defeat. "May I at least _see_ Mr. Potter?"

Poppy felt the sudden hysterical urge to make her say "please" before giving in, but thankfully managed to stifle it quickly.

"Certainly," she said amicably. "Please follow me." She said, walking delicately towards the back curtained off corner of the room.

…

Minerva knew that Poppy would see her sudden arrival in the infirmary as nothing short of an all out invasion of her space. Poppy was always ten times more difficult to deal with when one of her regulars was injured in anything other than the typical manner.

She knew that Severus was one of those regulars, or favorites as it translated to in Poppy's vocabulary. Upon returning to school every year, following the summer holidays, he had been forced to spend a few hours every day under her fastidious care for the first week or so of term, in order to fully recover from the traumas he had endured while at "home."

She had never told him that she had fully supported his petition to remain at Hogwarts during that wretched part of the year. Albus had always had his little quirks, or insecurities, as she privately thought of them as, and that was of them. He simply could not be made to see reason, even in the face of overwhelming evidence against him.

Therefore, the sight that met her as she turned the corner past the privacy curtains did not really faze her, all considering. She wasn't quite sure when the change had occurred between Severus and Mr. Potter, but she had a hunch that Poppy had been involved somehow, in some sort of fashion.

Mr. Potter was lying on Severus's chest, his hand fisted securely—and perhaps covetously—in Severus's dark shirt. Severus's arms were wrapped tightly around him in what was obviously a very protective embrace by the man.

They were both asleep and frankly, she had to admit, looked completely exhausted.

All in all though, the situation was more than a bit unnerving, as well as being more than a little bizarre.

"Does Albus know any of the details surrounding—," she paused and then continued, "—this?" She said, completely her question with a wave of her hands in the general vicinity of the dark headed and inextricably wrapped pair.

"Albus has not _graced_ me with his presence in more than a week," Poppy said, grinning a naughty smile, reminding Minerva inexorably of the Cheshire Cat.

"You mean that you haven't lifted the curse charm yet?" She asked, somewhat amazed, yet not all that surprised.

Poppy looked at her with wide innocent eyes, but the smile was still the same.

"Of course not," Minerva said, speaking the answer for her. "How long does it take to wear off, may I ask?"

"Oh, about two and a half hours," Poppy said casually, fixing the blankets around the two patients.

"Have you tried removing Potter from his arms?" She asked the other woman curiously.

"I haven't tried, but if you'd like to, feel free. Although, I'm sure Longbottom could tell you what the possible consequences of touching him without his permission or knowledge might be—well, when he wakes up again, that is. Poor boy," she said, making it quite clear from the look on her face that it would be an idiotic thing to try.

"When will they awake?" She asked.

"Given both of their histories, I'd take a guess and say that they'll awake before the rooster crows tomorrow morning," she said with an audible sigh.

"Even with dreamless sleep?" Minerva asked incredulously.

"Yes," the older woman said sadly, lightly brushing some of Severus's black hair out of his face with her fingertips.

"Good night Poppy," Minerva said, turning and leaving the way she had come.

"Good night dear," Poppy said softly, before extinguishing the rest of the lights and heading to bed herself.


	22. Pain

Ron hurt with a strange sort of desperation that he couldn't possibly have tried to explain even if someone had cared to ask.

The lights were out, but he could still see around him. Presumably, better night vision was one of the unmentioned side effects of Fless.

His mouth tasted like the floor of an unwashed public lavatory, which would be a nauseating thought, if there was anything solid still in his stomach to bring up. He was pretty sure that someone had pissed in his mouth at some point, and even more worrisome, he remembered being insanely grateful for the presence of the warm acidic liquid running down his throat, washing away the taste of cum from his sore throat and mouth.

The strange desires that had permeated his brain for the past several hours were currently on a back burner in his brain, allowing him some brief peace of mind, not to mention partial clarity of thought.

The _need_ for the drug and the sex itself wasn't gone exactly, but in that moment, all he could feel was a very light tingle. Apparently he was in a waning stage following his last orgasmic high.

There were about a dozen passed out boys around him, but his brain would not let him think on why he knew them so very well. He just knew that they had something to do with the previous hours of driving need and desire that had clouded his mind and thoughts so very completely.

It still bothered him that he didn't know where his trousers were, but he now had a reason for why that bothered him so very greatly. His _wand_ was—or had been—in the trousers pocket of those trousers. Plus, as he felt with a sick sort of dread sinking its way through his gut, that wand wasn't even _his_. It was Hermione's.

_Oh no, what if she wanted to get it back at some point?_

Sadly enough, it didn't even occur to him that someone might have missed his _presence_ as well. Rather, all he could think of was her anger at his running off with _her_ wand. For the first time then, he looked around him and realized that there didn't seem to be any doors in the room that they were in.

Beside him, Blaise grunted something about 'leaving off the pickles,' but otherwise, didn't wake.

Ron was aware enough now to be disturbed by his desire to plunder Blaise's arse, sans lube, given that he didn't know where it was at that moment.

But there it was, just so perfect and— _stop that—_ he commanded himself, trying to snap himself out of the idea. He thought of dead things, cold showers, Harry's Uncle Vernon— _Merlin, ugh_ —until the awful desire had vanished from the forefront of his mind.

Wearily, he tried standing up, only to realize that his body felt the same as when he had last suffered a very severe fever. He managed to get upright once, only to realize that the world had begun tilting madly around his head, forcing him to squat down in a low crouch with his head on the ground until the feeling passed.

 _What's happening to me?_ He wondered to himself worriedly.

He had noticed that while many of the boys around them were bound with a chain to another boy, he and Blaise were still free—if there was such a term, he groused to himself, feeling the faint flickerings of hope at hearing his sarcasm reassert itself weakly in his head.

He decided that standing wasn't really all that exciting a premise after all; crawling seemed much safer, really, now that he thought about it.

He moved across the room slowly, his joints protesting mightily at the slight movement, while his shins felt like they were crying. Actually, as he took the time to look, he realized with a start that the act of crawling even a few feet across the mattress-covered floor was enough to cause them to begin bleeding, if only ever so slightly.

Due to the blood and haze that his mind was still wrapped rather significantly in, he did not realize that the blood was coming from the many only half-healed wounds—some of them rather inflamed now—that were covering his body rather prolifically.

Thus, it made sense to him that he would be better off picking his way across the room like a monkey, as opposed to a child, on his feet and hands. Although that worked better, he was still unable to move farther than three or four feet without feeling the overwhelming need to stop and recover, lest he begin dry heaving, or simply pass out.

So he made his way over to the far wall like that slowly, before finally making it. He slumped against the wall's flat surface with heavy sigh, which shortly turned into a gasp as his worn out nerve endings finally relayed the message to his brain that the wall was very _cold_.

Even though the cold of the wall was almost too much to be born, he still liked the feel of it against his aching body. It felt far more _real_ than anything else that he had experienced thus far—that day?—since ending up in this place. For the first time, his mind felt as though it were actually making some headway through the pervasive fog that had been in place since he had last attended potions.

His face scrunched as he tried to remember what had happened that day; something out of the ordinary had happened, and he was pretty sure that he had been involved somehow. He was slowly inching his way down the wall now, likely leaving a blood trail as well, although the thought wasn't important enough to actually occur to him.

 _Snape had been angry,_ he was pretty sure. But then again, that wasn't particularly uncommon a sight, was it? He couldn't be absolutely sure. His memories were beginning to muddle together, and thinking took energy that he simply did not have. He really didn't actually have a plan. He just wanted to find his trousers and Hermione's wand. _After that_ was a concept he couldn't seem to put together in his ridiculously exhausted brain. In fact, he likely would have wandered around the room several times before collapsing completely if he had not run into a piece of furniture that he had never before noticed while in his previous fog.

It was wooden, if his fingertips still knew anything, and as he felt around the edges, he realized that it had shelves and likely was some kind of bookcase or storage area.

He peered into the space between the shelves and thought it a bit odd that the closed in space around him was all highlighted in a frighteningly pale green. He decided to ignore it, thinking that if they had put his clothes anywhere, this would probably have been it.

There were only three shelves, all easily reachable from his position on the floor, where he was resting on his knees. He reached his arms in, still blind to the trauma that was likely hindering a great deal of his movement, particularly in regards to his fine motor skills. He found a shirt that he didn't recognize—and which smelled atrocious, so he tossed it to the side—followed shortly by a robe and some mismatched socks—those he took and put on, although it took him at least three tries per foot, even though he was sitting down. He went through the bottom two shelves fairly thoroughly, especially given his state.

He was sweating lightly now, and the urge for getting another hit was beginning to make itself known. However, he was focused enough on finding his trousers—and subsequently Hermione's wand—that he could ignore it, for now.

He realized with a dreadful feeling, most likely tied into his need for the Fless, that his trousers weren't on the bottom two shelves, and he was going to have to pull himself up a bit farther to see into the top shelf.

He clambered his way up, standing in what could most closely be described as a hunched over position, much like the form that miners find themselves working in for several hours at a time.

Now upright, sweat dripping into his eyes, burning them slightly, he just reached in and grabbed things at random, with the vague hope of sorting through the pile when he was back on the ground once more.

There wasn't anything left on the shelf, not that he could see at least. Wearily satisfied that he had completed his most recent objective, he sunk slowly on to his cracked and bleeding knees once more. He went through nearly the entire pile before finding a pair that he thought he recognized. The trousers were a bit worn out, because they had previously been Percy's.

 _Because the twins had a giant growth spurt last summer where they just passed right over my height_ , he thought to himself as his brain began wandering away once more.

Quickly, he pulled them on over his bare rump. He didn't know where his underwear was, nor did he care. He now was wearing black school slacks over mismatched socks. With a literal jump, he reached into his pocket, his fingers searching blindly for the wand.

He had nearly pulled the pocket inside out before he realized that he was looking in the wrong pocket. He felt desperation beginning to fill him as he reached inside his other pocket.

Suddenly cool relief washed over him as his fingers grasped the smooth wood of the wand. It tingled its reception to him, obviously as glad as he was at being reunited.

Looking up, he noticed that the room was growing smaller by the minute as his need grew under his skin. He looked down and was surprised to see himself wearing trousers.

 _These will get in the way of fucking,_ his brain gibbered at him idiotically.

He had to get them off. He had to— _wait, where's Blaise?_ His feverish mind was jumping around wildly now. He looked up towards where Blaise was lying, and walked directly there, completely oblivious to the blood squelching in his odd looking socks. Having made it there, miraculously without stepping on anyone, he looked down at the dark skinned boy with desire and almost love tinged in his brightly delirious eyes. He kneeled down beside him, ready to wake him up for more of what they both needed, when his eyes made contact with the cloth thing covering his lower half.

He looked down at them, his face scrunching up as he tried to determine their purpose for appearing on his body. Without thinking, he reached to unbutton the clasp on them, but stopped, completely dumbfounded at seeing a wand tightly clasped in his fingers.

The wand meant something. He thought that he had known that at one point, long ago. He scratched his face, leaving bloody smears wherever his fingertips had touched.

 _It's not mine_ , he thought stupidly. The thought was an important one. His mother had gotten the message across to him more than once that stealing was very _wrong_ , and should he ever find something of someone else's, then he was to return it immediately.

 _But I don't know who it belongs to!_ He thought wildly, wishing that she were there to help him.

 _Who's she?_ He thought vaguely to himself after another moment of wide-eyed staring at the wand that was somehow still in his hand.

And then a minute later, he had a thought about how to fix the problem.

 _Hermione would know. Hermione would know._ He continued repeating the thought in his head, as he staggered across the room, instinctively heading for the bathroom.

He looked over to the far wall, only to be met with the sight of a floo entrance in the badly lit, dingy excuse for a washroom. He walked in squishy socks across the dirty floor, leaving bloody sock prints behind him. In turn, his socks seemed to pick up some of the grime from the floor, actually giving him a bit of traction as he went. It certainly didn't detract any from his tortured looking figure.

Absentmindedly, he reached for where the floo powder almost always was, grabbed some of the powder, which luckily was there, and threw it into the grate in front of him.

The greenish flames distracted him for nearly too long as he soon could not remember what he was doing, let alone where he was going.

Suddenly he saw that he was holding something in his hand and he looked down, promptly amazed to be holding such a pretty wand.

 _Hermione knows what to do_. The thought came to him unbidden, and when he looked back at the green flames once more, he now had something to say to.

"Take me to where Hermione Granger is." He said, half falling, half walking into the ubiquitous and familiar flames associated with traditional wizarding travel.

Although his request was less than a standard instruction, it still managed to work for the boy. Perhaps the floo itself took pity on the boy; perhaps the magic was able to recognize the absolute desperation that was running rampant through his mind and body as he made his request. All they knew afterwards, as they were slowly trying to make sense out of what had happened, was that although it _had_ worked, it should not have.

Ron was belched out into a classroom that would have been familiar to him, only days before. Now however, he saw very little in front of him in his blind desire to find Hermione. He missed the look of absolute shock and horrified dismay over the state of his appearance, as well as his entrance, that suddenly appeared on every one of his classmate's shocked faces. He didn't hear Professor McGonagall's voice proclaiming with obvious relief over his being alive.

Instead, he walked resolutely into the middle of the room, still leaving those same bloody footprints behind him—only now they were mixed with grime _and_ soot—and turned towards a girl on the front row, a girl with large front teeth and bushy brown hair.

He turned his wildly distraught looking eyes onto her face and opened his cracked and openly bleeding lips, obviously preparing to speak, even as he swayed unsteadily before her.

"I need to find Hermione. Can you help me find her?" He croaked out roughly, oblivious to the bloody spit that had emerged at the corners of his mouth by the end of his two sentences. He continued to look at her, even as obvious confusion appeared on his face at her silence and closed eyes.

As for Ron, his eyes had already begun losing focus before her body ever hit the floor, unconscious from shock.


	23. Backtracking 24 Hours (ish)

Severus Snape had awoken early that Sunday morning with a vague plan in place for the day. Stealthily he had put his shoes on—not the easiest task when trying not to wake up the small twelve year old boy who is still asleep in your arms—and crept out of the infirmary before the morning light had ever touched the windows.

He was a little over twenty meters down the hallway before he heard her tiny footsteps rushing to catch up with him. Thanks to the _still_ sleeping boy in his arms, he knew that she would not screech at him to stop. She would have to physically catch up with him to berate him for leaving, or sneaking out rather, of the infirmary on his own.

 _Well, I'm not on my own, am I Harry?_ He thought to himself as he looked at the white faced boy still in his arms. He increased his stride as much as he dared to without having to worry too much about disturbing the boy's sleep.

He could hear the tiny footsteps pick up speed in response to his change in stride. He sighed, knowing that she would catch up with him sooner rather than later, but was unwilling to give in to her so easily.

 _It was part of the fun, after all_ , the hysterically exhausted voice said in his mind before going off to find a quiet corner to laugh to itself in.

He really needed to sleep for twelve hours or so in his _own_ bed, which just so happened to be in his _own_ quarters.

He didn't want to look behind him, because he knew that he would be faced with the image of a tiny red faced woman chasing him down the corridors of Hogwarts at way too freaking early in the morning.

He listened carefully to the way her footsteps were ringing against the stone hallways, and decided that yes, she was going to catch up to him somewhere around the main entrance of the castle.

Once, as a teenager, he had tried taking random passageways and hiding out in unused classrooms in his effort to throw her off his trail. By the time he had figured it would be safe to come out again, she had been standing directly outside the door of the room he had been in.

He _still_ didn't know how she did it, and she wouldn't tell him either. As a spy, and a man who had possessed an unusually inquisitive mind from birth, the fact that he couldn't figure out the mystery really irritated the hell out of him.

She caught up to him just past the Great Hall, at the bottom of the first flight of stairs that led down to the dungeons. He half expected her to tackle him, which she actually had done before, if not for Harry's presence.

"SEVERUS." She whispered, clearly annoyed at his attempt towards leaving without her express permission.

 _Likely she's pissed at you for having to chase you throughout half the castle as well_ , the still giggling voice whispered in his ear.

"Yes Poppy?" He asked in an inquiring tone, turning to look at her curiously as though he had no idea that she had been chasing him for the past ten minutes.

"Don't even try it," she said, narrowing her eyes vehemently at him.

He was a bit amused at the growl that he had heard in her voice. He started walking down the hall again, trying to make it look like a meandering stroll.

He got an entire classroom length down the hall before she _accidentally_ stomped on his foot.

"Ow?" He said, trying to make his face seem intimidating as he looked down at her. Students were constantly terrified of him. Filius was often terrified of him as well. His former students would cross over to the other side of the street rather than walk down the sidewalk beside him. Why couldn't she be the same way?

"If you will excuse me Poppy, I need to put a child down before my arms fall off or he wakes up, whichever occurs first," he said, raising an eyebrow.

"If you had stayed _put_ in your bed, then that wouldn't be a difficulty, now would it?" She was whispering to him, but he could still hear the screech clearly coming through regardless.

"I will stay put in _my_ bed, if you would be so kind as to allow me to do so." He said smartly, turning and trying to head back down once more. To his very extreme surprise, she did not stop him, but walked beside him in stern chiseled silence instead.

They made it down another set of stairs before he gave in to the need to speak to her.

"Do tell me that you aren't just following me—or us rather," he said, looking carefully down at the small head on his shoulder, "because you're trying to avoid another infamously difficult physical with Albus Dumbledore?"

He looked down to see if she would respond to his ridiculous premise.

She glared at him for a moment before replying.

"Severus, I would have to agree to let him back into the infirmary in order to give him a physical." She said cryptically.

"And we all know how steadfast you are about standing by your decisions, don't we Harry?" he said, nodding seriously while hearing his inner persona giggle heartily. He looked down at the boy in quietly veiled surprise at suddenly feeling him nod his head in agreement to Severus's question. The boy's eyes were still closed, but Severus was almost positive that the boy was grinning against his shoulder.

 _Perhaps Poppy didn't notice_ , he thought, knowing that it was more likely that he might actually sneak successfully out of the infirmary someday.

He looked up and noticed with no small amount of relief that they had made it to his home turf. This hallway was almost like a front lawn for him. The students who dared come here with naughty ideas in mind often were met with less than pleasant consequences.

"So Poppy," he said, deciding to break the once again formidable silence with yet another inane question.

 _Merlin he needed sleep_.

"Have you ever pulled Albus off of active duty? Can you even do that?" He asked her, actually somewhat curious in spite of himself.

"Yes I have that ability." She said, grinning her planning smile up at him.

"Uh oh," he heard Harry say very faintly from where his mouth was pressed against his shoulder.

 _Uh oh indeed_ , he thought to himself.

"And yes, I have used it before."

They had made it to his rooms. He touched the wall with his hand, before tapping his wand three times on one of the stones in front of him, then three more times on another, followed by nine short taps on a stone directly in front of his eyes.

Abruptly a doorway appeared in the stones and he stepped partially inside.

"Oh by the way Severus," Poppy said, placing a small hand on his arm.

He looked down at her darkly, pensively waiting for her punishment.

"I'm putting you on house arrest until Wednesday, unless some kind of emergency should arise in which your presence is directly needed." She said, smiling sweetly up at him.

He glared down at her, displeased at her decision.

"Off you get!" She said, flinging a kick at his knee which he avoided only by jumping backwards. Behind him, the door closed with an unusually loud sounding thump. He snarled at it as he realized that she had charmed it shut. She was serious about not letting them leave his quarters.

Suddenly he realized that there were quiet giggles coming from the boy in his almost numb arms.

Maybe he could learn how to work out in his sleep.

_Hmm._

"All right, quit pretending." He said huffily, walking down the hallway towards where his bedroom was.

The boy erupted with painfully high pitched giggles that didn't die down until Severus was sitting on his bed, attempting to wrestle one handed with his shoes.

"I trust that you are quite done now with that infernal racket?" He said towards the small lump of boy that was still nestled firmly into the crook of his shoulder.

The head of the small lump of boy nodded, but he could still the smile stretched across the boy's still far too white face.

 _Small Lump Of Boy. SLOB,_ he thought to himself nonsensically. _Makes sense,_ the persona said quietly in response.

"All right SLOB," he said, giving into the insanity for a while. "Will you be okay if I put you down for a moment while I change into sleep clothing?"

"Slob? I'm not a slob," the boy argued in a muffled voice from where he still had his face pressed against Severus.

"That remains to be seen, does it not? Regardless, I was not calling you a slob. I called you _SLOB_ \- it's an acronym for 'Small Lump Of Boy,'" he said with mild amusement, especially after feeling the boy's awkward expression being pressed against his arm at hearing the explanation.

"Back to the original question, SLOB," he said, enjoying the boy's annoyance at his nickname for him.

"Okay," Harry answered quietly, still not moving his face away from where it was pressed.

Severus really wanted to ask him how he was actually managing to continue breathing from that position, but decided that he was too strung out to handle the resulting discussion.

Carefully, he pulled—although it felt more like he was having to literally _peel_ —the boy off of the side of his chest and placed him on the bed. Instantly the boy pressed his face against the bedcover, before curling up in his SLOB position once more.

 _Curious and curiouser,_ he mused silently before quickly taking off his robes and underclothes. He had gotten his pajamas on before realizing that his bladder was demanding immediate attention.

"SLOB," he said while running a hand over his face in annoyance that he had to warn the boy about going to the bathroom.

"Sir?" The boy asked, his voice still muffled.

Severus found that he could not keep himself from rolling his eyes at the entirely too bizarre situation he had somehow found himself in the midst of.

"I'm going to step into the room just next door for a moment to take care of some—ah—personal business." He said, feeling like a complete and total ass.

He moved around the bed without waiting for a response, but noted with peculiar amusement that the boy had started scooting across the top of the bedcover as soon as he was more than two meters away from him. The child hadn't even looked up. It was peculiar, to say the least.

He went into the bathroom and shut the door behind him with a resounding thump to prove his independence. Still, he went about his business quickly, telling himself that he feared what might happen to his rooms should he leave the child alone for too long.

Upon opening the door, he quite nearly fell over the boy. Apparently the boy had managed to make his way over to the doorway while Severus was in the bathroom and was now in his familiar position, but at his feet instead.

"There _is_ another bathroom on the other side of my quarters, should you ever need it while this one is occupied," he said, trying not to make the boy think he was angry at him for his obvious clinginess.

"Oh," said the muffled voice of his SLOB.

"Would you like to use the bathroom?" He asked, thinking that Poppy was likely laughing to herself at his expense.

"That would be nice," the muffled voice said from the floor.

He stepped over the boy and then stared at him when the child did not move.

"Trust me, neither of us are going anywhere until Wednesday, when Poppy releases us." He said in irritation from her meddling.

The boy didn't speak.

Severus leaned over the boy and picked him up, knowing that he was going to regret this soon enough. He was also forced to admit to himself that he _had_ missed the presence of the small warm body pressed up against his side while he was in the bathroom.

"Okay," he said as he stood in front of the toilet with his arms around his SLOB.

"If I leave you here and shut the door, can you go on your own?"

The boy didn't answer. Severus took that to mean no.

"If I leave you here and stand on the other side of this room with my back turned, can you go on your own?"

"Okay," replied the muffled voice.

Severus set the boy down with a firm warning not to go shoving his face against the toilet base, before stepping away and turning around with his arms crossed over his chest, not believing himself.

It took a minute, but then he thankfully heard the blessed sounds of urination occurring from behind him. He had never been so thankful to hear those sounds in his life.

After an incredible length of time, especially given the size of the child in question, he finally heard the sound of pants being readjusted and the flushing of the toilet.

He turned around to see that the boy had already resumed his SLOB position on the floor. Severus was immensely thankful to see that the child had taken his warning to heart and seemed to be pressing his face into his arms instead.

"I think we'll worry about the cleansing of your teeth another time." He said, leaning over and picking his familiar SLOB.

"Okay," came the familiar muffled reply.

Severus was starting to think that muffled speech should be considered another language. It worried him to no end that he was starting to get used to the sound.

Before putting them both down, he pulled out his wand and spelled the boy's hands and teeth clean.

The boy growled into his shoulder.

In turn, he told him that the sound wasn't nearly as intimidating when it came from a muffled SLOB.

The boy replied by poking him in the neck, of all places.

He responded by growling.

The boy made a loud squeak and squeezed himself even farther against Severus's body.

"I'm starting to get the feeling that if I let go of you, you won't move any." Severus said dryly in the direction of the boy's head.

"Have to try harder than that to get rid of me." The boy said, speaking his longest sentence yet.

 _Intriguing,_ he thought.

He was standing in-between the doorway of the bathroom and the bed. His feet were beginning to get cold.

"Are you tired?" Severus asked.

The boy mumbled in the affirmative.

Severus raised an eyebrow at the sorry excuse for speech, but decided to bring the issue up later.

"Good, because I'm going to bed," he said, pulling the soft blue-green bedcover and accompanying thinner blankets back from the headboard. He noted that he was getting fairly adept at doing tasks with one arm. He wondered if he should be bothered by that fact.

Then he glanced at the headboard and the image of the boy's headboard covered with pieces of the child's skin and bright with his blood entered his mind unbidden.

"There are no windows down here," he said, unsure of whether he was assuring himself or the SLOB.

The boy said nothing, but nodded knowingly against his shoulder.

He climbed into the bed, spelling off the lights as he went. He felt his SLOB relax a tiny bit as he moved around in an effort to get comfortable. They lay there quietly in the darkness for a bit, getting used to each other in the different, larger bed. Severus, for his part, got used to having full circulation in his arms again.

Surprisingly, Harry was the one to break the silence.

"Sir?" He heard a timid voice say.

"Yes Harry?" He answered.

"Were you telling the truth when you said you couldn't leave until Wednesday?" The child who was halfway on his chest asked him in only a semi-muffled voice this time.

 _Ah, reassurances_ , he thought, with a resigned feeling in his heart.

"Yes Harry." He responded, answering the boy's direct question, yet feeling the need to continue onto discussing the unasked, yet clearly apparent, fear.

"I am not planning on going anywhere without informing you otherwise." He said; rubbing circles into the boy's back until he felt the tense muscles begin relaxing themselves under his very fingertips.

"Thank you," the boy whispered to him sleepily.

"I hope that you will be kind enough to extend me the same courtesy," he replied, needing to say the words before the boy fell completely asleep.

"Yes sir," the boy said, yawning widely against his chest.

The man who was Severus Snape, the snarky potions master of Hogwarts, who also happened to be an ex-Death Eater and generally just an all-around bastard of a human being, leaned down and kissed the boy lightly on the top of his head shortly before the child fell completely asleep. His fingers lightly and slowly stroked the hair on the boy's head as he slept, feeling him relax further into the man's calm touch as he did so.

"Good night Harry," he whispered softly before closing his eyes as well.

…

Neville was stiff and sore still when he was released from the infirmary, but he didn't argue with the stern woman's decision. She released him just in time for Herbology and he was glad to be able to go.

He realized shortly that class simply was not the same without Ron or Harry there to crack jokes or simply complain good naturedly about the class itself. He found himself missing them, even though he still was able to enjoy himself in the class.

Afterwards, he asked Dean whether or not anyone had been found to teach their Defense class, only to find out that Dean didn't know if they were _even_ looking for anyone, given the fact that there was less than a week remaining before the Christmas holidays. Looking or not, it didn't matter, since there wasn't anyone to cover the class other than Dumbledore, and no one had even said anything about that possibility except Peeves.

He had tried to talk to Hermione about it after the class, but she had told him point blankly that she didn't know anything and she wished to goodness people would quit asking her as though she were some kind of damn guru.

"But Hermione!" He had gasped, running after her against the freezing wind. She had set off from him in a fast stride towards the castle obviously angry with the entire situation.

Just outside the castle, next to the extremely cold masonry of the steps leading up to the Great Hall, she stopped and turned towards him, startling him so much that he had fallen flat on his backside in a great big pile of hard packed snow. It hadn't done much to help his overall physical wellbeing.

"What?" She asked, looking at him in rare exasperation.

"I just wanted to know if you'd heard anything more about what might have happened with Ron." He said quietly, in a voice that was barely audible over the wind.

"No," she said, looking at something past him with very dark eyes. "But I did hear that his parents came in yesterday, sometime after you were released from the hospital." She said, looking at him with a piteous expression.

Neville rather despised pity. He got it enough from well-meaning folk to the point that it was almost enough to turn his stomach at times, but now, to get it from someone he considered a _friend_ , he almost became angry enough to kick out at her.

"Do you need help standing up?" She asked him, not really looking at him.

"No, I've got it." He said, really trying not to be angry with her. He had to turn over in order to get his footing on the icy ground, but finally he got it.

He turned around and saw her still standing there. It surprised him, considering how out of sorts she seemed lately.

"I hate being me sometimes," she said softly before accompanying him up the stairs and inside.

He looked at her shocked, but not uncomprehendingly. There had been many times in his life that he had felt the same way, but he didn't think that someone as smart and talented as Hermione would ever feel the need to say the same thing.

He didn't know what to say, so he kept his mouth shut. He had finally learned that it was almost always safer to just to be quiet, rather than say something and get slapped for it. He had noticed that girls did a lot of slapping when they became angry.

"Sometimes I wonder if the world would actually notice if I disappeared as well," she said, leaning down and giving him a small kiss on the cheek. She walked off for real that time as he stood in wonder, not even daring to touch the spot on his face where her lips had been.

…

Minerva looked out at her slightly smaller second year Gryffindor class with pained eyes. She had gotten a visit from Molly and Arthur the day before that had not gone nearly as well as she had hoped. Molly had been nearly grey from worry and Arthur had been reduced to blustering endlessly in her face about her apparent communication inability. She was fairly positive that they didn't mean the cruel things that they had said about the school and her leadership style. Furthermore, she was fairly certain that they would apologize as soon as Ron was safe and sound, but she was quite sure that if his absence dragged out too much longer, higher parties would soon be involved with less than desirable outcomes emerging as a result. Given that she quite liked her job and position in life, she hoped for her sake as well as theirs, that Ron was found sooner, rather than later.

After they had finally left, she had gone looking for Severus once more, only this time choosing to start with Poppy first. Poppy had been surprisingly helpful, and more than a little gleeful in dispersing the information.

Apparently, she had put him on house arrest with the hopes that he would sleep most of the time, given his recent injuries and stresses involved in the higher than average rate of having to save Mr. Potter from imminent demise.

As for Mr. Potter, she had informed Minerva in that same excited voice, he was there with Severus.

At hearing those words, Minerva had been less than kind in giving her opinion on the dangers therein, but Poppy had set her straight rather harshly by explaining more about the situation which had occurred in the tower.

"Harry only trusts Severus." Poppy had told her in no uncertain terms.

Truly, it was a situation and a sentence that she had not been expecting to ever encounter. Severus was possibly the coldest bastard she had ever met, but after her talk with Poppy, she had been forced to reexamine her opinion of the man.

After all, Albus had been the one to willingly allow the child to be sent home year after year, fully knowing what the boy faced in that household. He had already done that to Harry once. Once was enough, in her opinion. Actually, if she could have gotten away with it, she would have never allowed the boy to be placed there at all. It wasn't right to treat a child in such a despicable manner.

And now, looking out at her classroom and seeing those two empty seats instead of the bright eyes of the two friends, it really struck a new kind of chord in her heart.

But she had pulled herself together and determinedly pushed on through the class period. It would have been easier though if the Granger girl hadn't been testing every inch of her patience the entire time. She knew that it was hurting the girl to be missing her two best friends—one lost and one seemingly misplaced—but that did not give her the right to rebel openly against her lessons.

All of that suddenly went out of her mind though as the floo in the classroom abruptly howled to life. She looked up at it, the worry evident across her face as she wondered at its meaning. Students were not allowed to use the floo, and generally the professors only used it times of extreme need. For all she knew, Voldemort could be about to walk through.

When it belched out its traveler, she knew instantly that he figure was not any of the professors there. He was too small for most of them, but was significantly larger than Filius, at least in height.

And then her mind seemed to blank out as the figure straggled across the threshold and into the light. All she could hear was a great roaring in her ears, as she nearly became completely overcome with shock at the grisly sight of what apparently was left of Ron Weasley.

"Thank Merlin you're alive," her mouth said without consulting with her brain. It didn't seem to matter since he seemed to be completely unaware of nearly everything around him.

His hair was matted down with dirt and other substances that she didn't want to peer too closely at, nor think too much about. He was dressed only in a pair of excessively loose pants, merely reinforcing her opinion that he looked far too gaunt to remain upright as he dragged one bloodied foot after another across the room. His torso was covered in more openly bleeding wounds than real skin, and what skin was there was literally grey with obvious fatigue. In addition, his fingers dripped blood haphazardly around him as he lurched along.

His eyes searched the room repeatedly in almost an aimless fashion, greatly reminding her of the motion of Moody's magical eye. They passed by her face at one dreadful point, and she found herself having to look away from the horrible dead fish look that stared out at her from that greenish white face.

Minerva, who had seen a great many things in her time, had never seen anything nearly as gruesome as this hollow excuse for a boy.

It didn't seem possible that the situation could increase in horridness, but she seemed permanently fated to be wrong about impossible concepts as he finally stopped his imprecise motion to look directly into the suddenly milk white face of one Hermione Granger.

He stared at her for what felt like an interminable time to everyone in the room.

It was during this pregnant silence that Minerva managed to pull herself together enough to cast a Patronus to Poppy in the infirmary. All she said in her short message was: "My class needs your quiet help. Do not bring Weasleys."

She had barely gotten the message sent when the pale shadow of a boy finally began speaking.

"I need to find Hermione. Can you help me find her?" She heard him croak out roughly to the girl he was seeking. Apparently the scene was too much for the Granger girl as she responded by passing out cold and falling roughly to the floor.

Minerva continued to stare at what was left of Ron Weasley as he continued looking at unconscious girl before him on the floor.

She saw him begin to sway once more and decided to stand up and try to move closer to him, lest he fall and break what was left of his body.

To her left, the door unexpectedly began opening, seemingly of its own accord, until the quiet figure of Poppy Pomfrey slipped delicately into the room.

The boy did not turn to look at her, but seemed instead to wilt before Minerva's eyes, as he seemed to lose all sense of his previous focus. To her class she raised a single finger to her lips, indicating that they needed to remain quiet until they had a handle over what was going on. They had fallen completely still at the delicate entrance of Poppy, but she needed to make sure that they continued to stay that way.

Unfortunately, the boy seemed to have other plans.

He no longer seemed to be aware of anyone else around him as he suddenly began shrieking in a voice that had more similarities to the cry of a banshee than the boy he should have been.

Unexpectedly, he darted out, moving much faster than should have been possible for him, considering the extent of his injuries. She saw right away that he was moving towards the floo, with possibly the idea of going back the way he had come. And he might have made it, except for the fact that the floo powder that was used for the classrooms was kept in a non-standard locale for the purpose of discouraging mischief.

He shrieked upon discovering he had been thwarted, still sounding far less like a human and more like a rabid creature of the night this time. As he turned, she saw something that she had not seen upon his initial appearance in the room.

In his hand he held a wand, and it was here that she looked at Poppy in consternation regarding his rapidly deteriorating state of mind. Against all odds, somehow the boy had managed to make it to the classroom of Hermione Granger. She looked at the boy as he was now; completely wild and unable to even string two syllables together. It seemed highly unlikely that he would be able to use the wand in the traditional manner of his school lessons, but nothing was likely about his case, so it was better to err on the safe side than not.

"Minerva," Poppy said speaking in an excessively calm voice, considering the situation. "Accio and I'll cushion," she said tersely.

Minerva nodded in understanding before quickly following her plan.

" _Accio_ wand!" She said, casting the spell towards the wand in Ron's bloodied hand. He was no match for her spell, regardless of whatever altered state he currently existed in. The wand was soon in her possession.

Ron Weasley, however, did not fall as Poppy had predicted but now seemed to be running—albeit rather drunkenly—towards her, seemingly intent on doing her harm. She quickly thought through her options even as Poppy made her move, casting the full body bind on him, followed shortly by _mobilicorpus_.

And yet, he still continued to howl even through his now clenched teeth. This time it reminded her of the sound of a desperately wounded animal facing a much larger predator. It was a sound that chilled her straight through to her bones, and she knew with some trepidation that it would be a sound that would likely stay with her for many nights—if not years—to come.


	24. New Truths

It always worried Poppy when faced with living folk who looked worse than most of the people she had been forced to pronounce dead.

It was late Tuesday morning and she was sitting in Severus's quarters in dark blue armchair that was arranged adjacent to the green couch where he sat with Harry. She was trying to think how to explain the situation that had arisen since she had placed him on house arrest.

She needed a way to stall for thinking time. It had seemed so much simpler when she had been back in the infirmary still listening to the mostly demented cries of the highly sedated boy.

"Is this a new development?" She asked, making light of the fact that Harry was now seated next to his professor, as opposed to on him.

"Quite," Severus answered, sounding much more severe than he had two days earlier. She took that to mean that he was feeling much better. He looked at her curiously, obviously wondering why she had appeared suddenly with the "wild urge to see him," only for her to arrive and sit and speak of nothing.

She really did need to speak with him, but she was weary of doing so with Harry in the room. It did seem a good improvement that the boy was no longer largely attached to Severus's chest.

"Harry, I was wondering if I might be able to speak for a moment or two alone with Professor Snape." She said, not unkindly.

Instead of answering, the boy looked at Severus with an odd sort of expression on his face.

What was even stranger than that, however, was Severus's resounding sigh.

She raised an eyebrow at them both and waited for an explanation.

"Things have gotten—," Severus began, speaking slowly before stopping altogether, mid-sentence. He looked at the boy, who looked steadily back, obviously intent on hearing his professor's answer.

"This situation, as you know, is already a bit more bizarre than it perhaps ought to be, considering our less than enthused past history." He said, obviously working his way up to the topic at hand. He looked back at Harry who was sitting up against him, and reached out a hand to the boy.

Harry grasped it with a small grin, as Severus turned back to her.

"And given our enforced time together over the past few days," he said, looking pointedly in her direction, "bizarre has started taking on new meanings for us." He said, speaking cryptically.

"Explain," she said, leaning back and folding her arms in front of her.

She watched as they stood up simultaneously together. That was a bit humorous, but she couldn't see anything particularly worrisome about it.

"I discovered, early on Sunday morning, that when not in my arms, the boy seemed to be following me all around the room." He said, having turned them so that they were looking at her directly, although still far enough back that she could see them both without having to move her head back and forth.

 _They are still holding hands_ , she noted with further intrigue.

"Well, then we discovered another facet of the puzzle after getting up this morning." He said, increasing her interest with every sentence.

He looked back at Harry.

"Like before," he said to the boy. The child nodded solemnly.

Severus moved the hand that was holding the boy's hand out and up, so that the boy was forced to raise his arm straight into the air.

And then he moved his arm a bit higher, so that Harry was forced to stand on his tiptoes in order to keep the connection.

And _then_ , he moved his hand higher still, literally lifting the boy off his feet.

"Severus!" She exclaimed angrily at him. "Of course he's not going to let go. Stop this at once." She commanded, quite shocked at his behavior.

"Ah, but what if _I_ let go?" He asked her, looking at the boy who was grinning down at her with excitement dancing in his eyes. It was only the boy's look that saved Severus from getting kicked in the knee— _or anywhere else_ —as she forced herself to wait and see.

"Like now," Severus said, raising his hand still higher, before releasing the boy's hand.

That was when she felt her jaw drop open; for the boy was still suspended above the ground, even though his outstretched arm and hand were no longer touching any part of Severus's body. She watched in growing amazement as Severus raised his hand higher, only to see the boy's body move higher as well in response.

"I agree Severus," she said in slightly disconnected awe. "That is a bit odd." She said, thinking that her last sentence was perhaps the understatement of the bloody year.

She watched silently as Severus lowered his arm back down. As soon as it was within grasping distance, the boy jumped— _in midair_ —and grabbed it, grinning excitedly at them both.

"I'm his SLOB," he said shyly, yet oddly proud about the statement.

" _Severus_ ," she said in her sternest lecturing voice.

"It's an acronym," the boy quipped brightly to her.

"Really," she said, still glaring up at barely grown boy who was rather close to losing a favored body part, if someone didn't start explaining what the boy had meant.

Harry, perhaps sensing her less than accepting tone, shrunk down about a foot from where he was standing, and then proceeded to hide behind the much larger man standing beside him. Considering that they were still holding hands, this resulted in Severus being forced to stand with one hand partially, if not rather awkwardly, behind his back while the boy hid from the apparently unhappy lady in front of them.

"Poppy." Severus admonished. "Stop scaring my SLOB," he said, grinning at her wickedly. It was quite an unusual look for him. She knew without a doubt that his current expression would most certainly result in tears from many of the younger students, without his needing to say a word.

"Am not scared," was the muffled response of the boy from behind Severus's back.

Severus turned around and knelt down before the boy, gathering him into his arms voluntarily, before turning back around to look at Poppy. In turn, she felt that it was rather obvious, from the probable look that was on her face, that his most recent action had just shocked the world on its ear, at least as she knew it.

"Do you see the Small Lump Of Boy here in my arms, Poppy?" He asked, looking darkly amused at her sudden understanding.

"Oh," she said, just looking at them for a moment. "You mean your SLOB?" She asked casually, joining in the bizarreness easily.

"Quite." He said while inclining his head towards her, undoubtedly pleased to have that cleared up.

…

Severus was glad that Poppy was his friend, as well as long time mentor. If any other medical professional had seen his latest change in personality, they likely would have suggested his being committed to a high level security mental hospital.

 _Of course, if they did that, they'd be committing the boy as well_.

It was clear to him that some kind of ancient magic was involved in their literally being connected. It seemed likely that it was some kind of outdated guardian-child tradition to be closely connected until the child could safely be left alone. He hoped that he was wrong in his evaluation of their situation. Harry was rarely anywhere near safe while with others, and practically never while alone.

The situation was likely going to cause more than a few new grey hairs to appear in his beard; luckily for him, he didn't keep a beard.

 _See_ , he thought to himself worriedly, _it's thoughts like that which are particularly beginning to disturb to me._

And then there was that _other_ issue—the new room that had suddenly appeared in his quarters that morning. He had thought that the castle would only respond to requests of Albus's, but he had apparently been mistaken. Rather, it seemed plausible that the castle was far more in control over its own self than anyone knew; leaving him to honestly wonder whether or not Albus was aware of the true reality of the situation.

"Poppy," he said once they were sitting again. "Albus _is_ still in direct control over the castle, is he not?"

Beside him, he could feel Harry suddenly twitch a bit, _likely in amusement_ , he thought sourly.

"As far as I know," she said, looking pensively at him. "Although, that control is not, or has it ever been, a complete and total control. None of the headmasters have ever been able to bind the castle completely to them or their wills. Strange things will always occur, but they are primarily on a small scale level." She said.

"So," he said, leaning back and automatically taking Harry's hand once more, "it would be unlikely that a room would ever appear on its own lest the headmaster had directed so?"

"No, the control that the headmasters have traditionally held over the, ah, _will_ of the castle, have not allowed for such things to spontaneously occur. Why do you ask?" She asked, her eyes narrowed in apparent curiosity.

"How much does the headmaster know of the current situation between Harry and me?" He asked, trying to see if his theory would actually hold water.

"I would assume that he is at least aware that you have both not attended classes for the past two days." She said. "As for whether he is aware of Harry's recently acquired connection to you, I would say that it is most unlikely that he knows of anything substantive, provided he is even aware of it to begin with."

 _Newly acquired connection_ , Severus thought grimly to himself. _That was certainly a way of explaining it_ , he thought.

"Could he not just ask the castle itself?" Severus asked casually.

"He could," Poppy said, leaning farther back and looking at him intently in return. "But he would only get an answer if the castle felt the desire to share the information with him. The castle, for all of its years in existence, seems to have many similarities to the teenaged denizens who roam its halls." She said, smiling a bit at the concept.

"So I ask you again," she said, leaning in closer to them both. "Why do you ask?"

Severus looked down at his lap to his hands, one of which was loosely clasping the much smaller hand of the boy who was still sitting quietly beside him. He glanced at the boy and saw him nodding his head in encouragement at him.

He scowled at himself for looking for encouragement from a still wet behind the ears, twelve year old boy, who also happened to be a Gryffindor, no less. In silent response, he felt the boy squeeze his hand, still far too perceptive of his moods than he might have often liked.

"This morning, upon waking, Harry and I came across an interesting—," he broke off, thinking for a word that wouldn't reveal too much to the overly insistent woman sitting in front of them, "—development," he finally finished, looking up at her darkly.

She was still waiting.

"I think we ought to show her, sir," the boy said in what was far too solemn a voice, considering his age.

 _And house affiliation,_ his inner voice added sulkily.

"Severus?" She asked, now intrigued.

"Fine," he huffed, standing up alongside the far too eager boy.

They went down the hallway first, followed closely by Poppy herself, to the door that had appeared in the wall sometime before their arrival in the conscious world that morning.

At seeing Poppy's look of consternation, he decided to help her out.

"You are correct. This door has never existed before, at least not in my tenure here." He said.

"Fascinating," Poppy said.

And then he opened the door, and looked into the room that had only first begun its existence earlier that day. On the far side of the room, there sat a child sized bed, already made up, with a soft dark red cover adorning it. Other than some empty bookcases, the only other thing that sat in the room was a battered trunk.

"My trunk!" The child beside him exclaimed joyously, even though he did not let go of Severus's hand to investigate it.

Therefore, Severus took a few steps into the room before releasing the boy's hand to gently guide him towards the obviously much revered object. The boy hesitantly took a step away from him, before stopping and looking back worriedly.

"What if it's been hexed?" The boy said softly, his green eyes large in his head.

" _Tell him that it's not been_ ," chuckled an unfamiliar voice from inside his own head. He raised his eyebrows in amazement at apparently hearing the unlikely voice of the castle inside his mind.

"According to the castle," he said after a moment, "it's not been."

The boy raised his own eyebrows in amazement after hearing him speak those very surprising words.

 _If the child knows anything about me, he should know that I am not the type to idly make jokes about such a thing_.

"Can you still check it?" The boy's still soft voice said nervously, breaking into the silence left in the room after the surprising revelation.

"Certainly," he said, gratified that the boy was still inclined to take his word over that of the castle itself.

" _Fine_ ," he distinctly heard the castle huff from within his mind _,_ as he ran the standard detection spells.

"The castle was correct," he said after a moment, smirking at the expressions of the two people around him.

And then it was as though the spell between them had been broken. Harry was dropping to his knees, digging through his trunk with a level of fervor that he had not seen often before from the small boy.

Meanwhile, Poppy was pushing him gently towards the corner of the room, an increasingly dark expression on her face.

"What is it Poppy?" He asked, glancing over at the boy again, as he dug through the growing mess in front him, clearly hunting for something.

She clenched her jaw, an expression she generally saved for situations that were _Very Bad_. Quickly, she cast a silencing spell and outlined the Weasley situation for him. After she had spoken tersely for several minutes, he realized that he was feeling haggard breaths coming from his connection to the boy through the charmed necklace. He had not even thought about taking the silver chain off since receiving it.

He turned his face towards the child, only to find him sitting on the floor, curled tightly in his SLOB position, hyperventilating silently to himself. Beside him, Poppy quickly ended the spell as they both rushed over to where he was on the floor.

Severus quickly gathered him up in his arms protectively, wondering what could have happened to reduce the boy so quickly to this state.

This time he did not bother to use magic to help his breathing, but merely held him tightly as he rubbed slow circles into the boy's rigid back muscles.

"Breathe with me Harry. In and out," he intoned repetitively to the boy under his care. He continued to do so until he began feeling the boy's muscles relax as his breathing slowly evened out. Standing at his side was an extremely quiet Poppy, currently holding out one of his personally brewed vials of calming draught.

He took it, nodding his thanks curtly at her, before administering it to the boy. The child barely made a face at the taste, which only served to increase his anxiety about him.

He walked out of the room towards his bedroom, with Poppy closely behind him. Once there, he lay down on the bed, indicating that Poppy should take a seat, before quickly spelling off the lights, leaving them in darkness. Upon extinguishing the lights, he had quickly felt the boy's arms begin creeping out across his torso to wrap more firmly around Severus's chest.

"Harry and I discovered that we work things better out in the dark, didn't we?" He asked his SLOB.

Harry squeaked a small distressed sound and nodded tearfully against his shoulder in response to his question. Severus could feel the hot tears as they began dropping onto the skin of his neck, but he did not feel it necessary to point this out to Poppy.

He also felt a small fist being made as it grasped the front of his shirt in what was quickly becoming yet another familiar motion, here in the darkness between strength and fearfulness.

"I've always enjoyed the darkness myself," Poppy's voice said gently from somewhere beside them. To his relief, the boy did not jump at her words, but listened to them quietly.

"Darkness is especially nice when you can lie safely in someone's arms, protected from the judgmental outer world." She continued speaking to them in that endlessly calm voice that frequently had served to put the younger Severus back to sleep after waking up from one of his more frightening nightmares.

"Uh huh," the boy shakily agreed.

"Do you feel that you can tell us about what it was that upset you?" Severus asked then, upon hearing that the boy had regained his voice somewhat.

The boy hurriedly shook his head against his arm, before negating his statement by slowly nodding his head once.

"I know that you seemed to be looking for something, correct?" Severus asked, taking the initiative with the child.

He felt another nod, and then heard a quivering breath being taken.

"My pictures," the boy whispered in a barely audible voice.

"What kind of pictures are these?" Poppy asked in an interested voice.

"H-Hagrid put an, he put an album together for me," the boy answered haphazardly.

"That certainly was nice of him. What kind of pictures did he include in the album?" She asked with a particular sort of patience that Severus appreciated.

"My parents," the boy said, his voice dropping back into his previously harsh whisper _._

"I saw what looked like an album next to where you were sitting, before we came in here," Severus said calmly. "I suppose that you found it, correct?"

"Yes sir," the boy said in a clearer voice, as the draught began making definite headway against his overwhelming fear.

"Did finding the album have anything to do with your sudden onslaught of fear?" Severus asked delicately.

"No sir." The boy said, shaking his head firmly in the negative.

Severus was gratified that the boy's tears had now stopped. In addition, he could feel the subtle movements of his legs as they slowly stretched themselves out of their previous SLOB state.

"I heard Poppy talking about R-Ron," the boy said, surprising them both.

"Child, what did you hear?" He asked worriedly, already suspecting the answer.

"All of it," came the muffled voice of the boy against his shoulder.

"Severus, what did he say?" Poppy asked him quickly.

_What, you can't understand muffled SLOB speak?_

"He heard the entire conversation." Severus answered instead.

He heard a small gasp from beside him and silently chided her from within his head. The last thing that they wanted was to make the boy think he had done something wrong.

"Am I sorry?" The boy asked him bizarrely, catching him slightly off guard with the oddly phrased question.

"No, you did nothing wrong," Severus said firmly, rubbing his thumb lightly over the boy's still damp cheek. "You have nothing to be sorry for," he said, saying it again in hopes that the boy would actually believe him for once.

"Harry, if anyone should apologize, it's me," Poppy said sadly. "I had not intended for you to hear our conversation."

"I thought I had seen you set your privacy spell." The boy said in a questioning, although not accusatory, tone.

"I thought that I had." She said, clearly confused.

"Trust me," Severus said. "You did, and then upon hearing the topic, _I_ set another one, just to make sure."

"You didn't cancel mine out accidentally?" Poppy asked sharply.

"No," Severus said, hearing an echo in Harry's quieter alto voice.

"I know 'cause I could hear you before Sev-I mean, before Professor Snape ever did his spell," the boy said, squishing his face hard against his shoulder in embarrassment at almost using the man's first name.

"Harry," he said, gently trying to pull the boy's face back into the air with his hand. "I should have said this earlier. I don't mind if you call me Severus while in my quarters." He said; smirking a bit at what the boy's shocked facial expression felt like against him. "I know Poppy has already given you the same permission, after all," he said, gently touching the child's head with his fingers.

"Honest?" The boy asked him in awe.

 _Honest_ , he said internally, not allowing himself to use the child's incorrect terminology.

"Yes," he said instead.

He smiled a bit in that protective darkness as the boy hugged him tightly for a second, before touching Severus's cheek as well, as though he were trying to make sure he was the real thing.

And then they were all silent again, as Severus waited for the boy's mind to make it back to the original problem. There was no way that they could simply pretend they were past the issue. It simply wasn't that kind of a situation.

Then, at long last, he heard the dreadful question posed in a wretchedly tiny sounding voice.

"Is Ron gonna die?"


	25. Delirium

They wouldn't give him what he needed. They wouldn't give him the Fless that his body was begging him for.

They just yammered at him endlessly in voices that didn't make any sense. He tried to tell them that he didn't speak their language, but it did no good.

He quickly discovered that the only way for him to make them react was to scream wildly at them. Likewise, it was the only way that he could make them see how he felt, how he suffered.

What he NEEDED!

He shrieked aloud once more, pulling and straining against the restraints that he could feel if not see. He spit wildly if any one of them came near enough to touch him with those horribly soft hands of theirs.

He bucked and shook the bed, right down to its frame, hearing and feeling a horrible grinding sound as the bed scraped against the wall behind him. The level of activity picked up as he did so, bringing a tiny woman to the forefront with that stick of hers pointed towards him.

He wished that she would just beat him and be done with it, but they all seemed intent on making him pay for sins that he could not remember committing.

He howled at her with long contained fury, especially after Malfoy had hurt him so desperately.

_Who the hell was Malfoy?_

And so he screeched in anger at not having access to his memories in order to answer that.

…

Back in the room that he had left, the boys took turns attacking Blaise. He was no longer being fed, nor were they wasting the Fless on him. His partner had disappeared, and now it was just a matter of time before he died from his body's inability to reconcile with that loss. They had begun taking him, two at a time and fast; purposely not replenishing his dwindling blood supply in an effort to quickly end his life.

It was the only kindness they could allow him as he suffered from his detrimental loss.

…

48 hours after Ron Weasley had appeared in Minerva's class, Poppy had been forced to admit she was over her head with the seriousness of the boy's case. She had hoped to involve Severus in the case, but given that he quite literally could not leave Harry alone, had been forced to make different plans. Luckily, she had been around the block more than a few times in her years of life, and had been able to call in a few friends who all had various types of specific in-depth experience in working with serious addiction cases. Of the three that were coming, two of the three were muggle born, providing them with plenty of knowledge about the familiar muggle drugs in addition to the wizarding ones.

They needed to figure out what kind of drug was in his system before they could adequately treat it. Magical drugs were especially problematic, as they frequently affected the person's magical core and consequently the person's surrounding environment.

So far, the boy was not responding to any of the typical levels commonly used with calming or sleeping draughts. On the other hand, he didn't seem to be aware of the pain from his multitude of injuries either, which appeared to be the only good thing about the entire situation.

Apparently, his moment of lucidity in making his way there was one of the few that he had experienced while under the mystery drug's influence. She and her friends had been staying with him around the clock, since the midpoint of the first day; at least two present at all time, and they had not yet seen another period of awareness in that entire time.

As for Severus, while technically this was his last day of enforced house arrest, they had discussed it and he had agreed—reluctantly—that with the winter holidays starting after classes in only two days hence, and the fact that he and the boy had not yet managed to make it more than three meters apart, it was better if he went ahead and cancelled those final two days as well.

He might have cancelled the classes themselves, but he had been damned if he would let them off that easily. Therefore, in the place of his classes, he had been sending out essay assignments by floo to his students' heads of house. In the case of his own house however, he had given the assignments to Poppy to deliver instead, given her old ties with the house of snakes.

The story that she had concocted to explain his disappearance apparently involved a need for him to be quarantined until his unknown sickness had cleared. It was an annoying story to stick to, but it was far better than trying to figure out a way to explain the truth.

…

Even though Severus was not directly involved with the case of Ronald Weasley, he had still been given the details by Poppy in hopes that he would be able to make connections that the others had missed.

After all, he was one of the foremost Potion Masters in Great Britain. It seemed likely that if anyone was able to figure out this unusual case, it would be him.

Following Harry's morbid question, and Severus's unwillingness to join the massive horde of adults who had consistently lied to him throughout his life, they had been forced to discuss the basic options of what might happen to the boy's friend.

Then, sometime after the boy had finally fallen into an exhausted sleep, he and Poppy had discussed it in more depth. He was certain that she must have found it amusing to continue the conversation in the dark, but he hadn't been willing to risk waking the child up, particularly after discussing with him the likelihoods of the death of his best friend.

Shortly before she excused herself, he had asked her if she would be so kind as to put through the paperwork from one of their previous discussions.

Agreeing quickly, she had walked over to their side of the bed and surprised him by kissing both of them lightly before saying goodbye for the night. From beside him, he'd felt the boy move a bit after her exit from the room.

"She kiss you too?" The boy had mumbled sleepily to him then.

"Yes, surprisingly enough," He had answered honestly.

"I like her," the boy said, drifting back down quietly.

"Me too," he had whispered.

…

Harry blinked into the dark room after sleeping for what had felt like eons.

Severus was apparently still asleep beside him, although he had found that he never could be quite sure in regards to the man. He was impressively deceptive in many things, _including pretending to be asleep_ , Harry had decided.

He wondered where his glasses were. Severus had already made the statement that he was taking Harry in for an eye exam before the next term started.

 _Provided they ever managed to disconnect from one another,_ Harry had added silently after that statement.

Logically, he knew that it would make no difference whether or not he had his glasses, since it _was_ completely dark in the room they were in.

 _Severus's bedroom_ , he thought with a thrill at being able to call him by his first name, even if he had only done it in his head thus far.

_Maybe they're in Severus's pocket._

Maybe he didn't really want them that much.

Maybe it was all moot, as Severus suddenly stretched beside him.

"All right child. What is it that you need?" Severus asked him calmly.

"Have you seen my glasses? And how'd you know I was awake?" Harry asked.

"Although you are rarely still when awake or asleep, you are usually far more predictable in your movements when asleep." He answered, making Harry's brain itch with the explanation.

"Furthermore, why on earth would you feel the desire to find your glasses while in a pitch dark room?" Severus asked in a slightly incredulous sounding voice.

"'Cause pitch dark rooms aren't always totally dark," he said decisively, before suddenly wishing he could take back the ridiculous statement, as it pertained to a memory that he'd just as soon forget.

"Indeed," the man replied inquisitively. "Please explain this wretched logic of yours"

"Ah," he said; his mind racing as he sought out a way _not_ to discuss the topic which he had accidentally mentioned.

"Very informative," Severus said sarcastically.

"Can we talk about something else?" He pleaded.

"What is it about this topic that worries you so?" Severus said, his voice becoming very quiet.

He opened his mouth, but found that he could not make himself explain his leftover memories of terror from what had happened in the dark with Ron that one day in Severus's classroom.

"Breathe slowly child." The man instructed suddenly, as he became aware of Harry's growing distress.

He didn't know why he felt the need to constantly bury his head against Severus's upper body, but knew that doing so made him feel infinitely better. He pushed his face down against the soft cloth of the man's shirt, which was warm from the innate heat of the flesh underneath.

He felt the man's hand stroke his hair softly, and he had to fight the urge to cry at not being able to remember his parents doing the same. No one had ever touched him as kindly as Severus, and lately he had found himself worrying that the man would be taken from him for daring to be nice to him.

"D'you suppose that my mum and dad loved me?" He asked, feeling completely random.

"More than anything Harry," Severus's voice answered firmly and without hesitation.

"Do you think that they'd mind?" He asked, feeling his throat clogging up with worry that Severus would get offended by his line of questions.

"Mind about what?" Severus asked patiently.

"Mind that you do also." He said, afraid of mentioning it, lest it stop occurring.

"What is it that I do also Harry?" Severus asked in that same calm voice, as he continued stroking Harry's hair softly.

"Love me," he whispered before shutting his eyes tightly against the man, fearing that he had just made a dreadful mistake.

Severus was silent for a moment, as the boy quaked beside him. He gathered him up, pulling him in close enough to kiss his forehead, before answering.

"No, I do not think that they would mind if I loved you." He said roughly over Harry's head.

"Am I worth it?" He asked, still whispering.

"Child, child," Severus admonished gently, while rubbing his hands comfortingly against his back once again.

"Yes, you are worthy enough to be loved; your mere existence should have been enough for you to have been loved in that so-called home of your so-called childhood. Dumbledore was a fool for leaving you there. Your childhood was a travesty that should have never been allowed into existence." He said strongly, pausing for breath before gently kissing him once more.

"Listen to me Harry. You have an extremely genuine and kind heart within you that somehow managed to survive those awful relatives of yours, even after all that you were forced to withstand. I remember your mother most strongly by the kindness that she extended me, even when it would have been far easier for her to follow in the footsteps of everyone else who regularly shunned me."

Harry had gasped upon Severus's mention of his mother. He hadn't even been aware that they had known each other. To hear Severus speak in such a loving way about all that she had done for him made Harry feel as though he had been given a tangible connection to the woman in his pictures.

He leaned up and kissed Severus quickly on the cheek before ducking back down, but put his back against the man's chest this time, feeling truly loved for the first time since he could remember.

"I bet that at the beginning of the year, you would have never expected to be voluntarily kissing your greasy git of a potions master, did you." Severus said as he genuinely laughed against the back of Harry's head.

It was a tickly feeling that he found himself liking, oddly enough.

"All right, time for breakfast," Severus said after a moment more. "And then I want you to clarify that other statement you made earlier," he said as he spelled on the lights.

Harry stuck his tongue out at him in exasperation, but felt that, following their most recent conversation, he didn't have quite as much cause to be afraid as he had been before.

…

Severus had not planned on mentioning anything about Lily to the boy, or at least not yet, but after hearing the child's heartbreaking questions, he had been unable to withhold such valuable information from him.

As it was quickly becoming evident, the boy's relatives had not done the memories of his parents any justice in their descriptions to him. He remembered Petunia and Lily from when they all three had been just children, and although he had not cared for Lily's sister much at that time, he had certainly never imagined that she would have grown up into such a despicable entity. It was revolting to imagine the depths of abuse that she must have forced the boy to endure over the course of his childhood in order to have made him truly believe that he was unworthy of love.

He silently promised himself that the boy would never go back to them, even if it meant their leaving Hogwarts for parts unknown in order to escape Dumbledore's likely wrath at his decision.

He looked over at the boy who was currently dressed in something barely fit for lining the bottom of a rodent's cage. The grayish rags were far too large for the child, both excessively long in both leg and arm, as well as being tattered and faded past recognition. Apparently the child's only recourse in addressing the length problem was to roll the ends several times over, just to be able to walk across the room without falling.

Before the boy's beloved trunk had appeared in the newly appeared extra bedroom, the boy had worn his hospital pajamas until Severus had thought to shrink an older outfit of his own down to size.

Severus knew that the boy's school clothes were adequate, from what he had seen in class alone, but the state of the rest of his clothing was absolutely beyond deplorable. The shock that had appeared at the child's heartfelt reactions to his own meager attempts at comfort had only continued to grow as the mystery of the boy's home life proceeded to unravel before him. Seeing the condition of the garments that the boy had automatically dressed in had merely provided another piece of the puzzle towards understanding that mystery.

"Child, do you know where the clothes you were wearing yesterday are?" He asked the boy.

"Oh," the boy said, turning quite red in reaction to his question. "I already put them down the chute."

"There is no reason for you to feel shame Harry," Severus said, laying a hand on the boy's shoulder. "It is those contemptible relatives of yours who should feel embarrassed towards their shoddy treatment of you and your wardrobe."

"Come, let us find something more acceptable for you wear today," he said, guiding the boy back into his bedroom and indicating that the boy should sit on the end of the bed.

He opened the closet door and heard the boy stifle a gasp at his doing so.

He turned around and raised an eyebrow at him in questioning.

The boy turned red again at his look, before stammering that he hadn't known that a person could own so many pairs of pants.

"Actually, you should see the headmaster's wardrobe sometime. I'm sure Poppy could tell you about it. Compared to him and many others, I own very little, actually." He smirked down at the boy who was still staring at him in wonder.

Quickly he pulled out a lesser worn knit shirt from the far end and shrunk it down to approximately the same size as he had done only the day before. Not surprisingly, the shirt was a dark gray. He had found that in addition to fitting with his overall persona and demeanor, darker colors also tended to not stain as noticeably as some of the gaudier color choices worn by some his colleagues— _Dumbledore_ , he thought in irritation.

"If I have misjudged your size, you will inform me, understand?" He said sternly to the boy who was fighting to remove the gigantic shirt from his torso.

"Yes sir," the boy said, blushing once more at Severus's admonition. As Severus had learned while watching the boy in the infirmary, the child simply would not ask for anything, like now with his obvious difficulty in removing the shirt.

"You know," Severus said, reaching over and quickly unknotting the shirt from around Harry's head, "this inability of yours to ask for help is part of your difficulty in Potions." He looked at the huge monstrosity that he was now holding in his hands with a look of disgust before casting _incendio_ on it, reducing the garbage down to a few flickers of ash.

He looked at the now scowling boy who was sitting on the bed with his arms crossed stubbornly— _or was it protectively?—_ against his chest as he waited for his next instructions. The boy was likely scowling at him for criticism about the boy's ability to ask for things.

"You will remove that petulant scowl from your face now. You are not a three year old and I am not your nanny." He instructed firmly, narrowing his eyes in distaste at the boy's sulking demeanor.

The boy responded by dropping his eyes and clenching his teeth.

Severus crossed his arms in annoyance and chose to wait him out. Harry's patience was no match for his.

Finally the boy sighed and looked back up at him, all traces of previous defiance gone from his tightly drawn face.

"Not everyone tells you things in order to hurt you, to purposely rile you. What I said was true; you get into trouble in my class because you make mistakes and then resort to guesses when you get in over your head." He said, lightening his tone a bit in hopes that the boy would explain some of the bitterness in his face.

"But you belittle people when they do ask for help, just like you do on our essays." The boy said, looking back down at his ragged jeans, "I tried to ask for help before, but it didn't do any good." He said quietly as he hunched over with his hands in his lap and stared at the far wall, away from Severus.

Severus stepped over to where Harry was sitting on the bed and sat down next to him. He looked over at the boy's hunched shoulders and was forced to bite his lip to keep from exclaiming over the myriad of old scars he saw littered down his back and between his shoulder blades.

 _Later_ , he promised himself, his shock and anger against the boy's muggle relatives still continuing to swell within him.

"My _belittling_ , as you put it, serves to enforce upon students the seriousness of Potions. Many students would do well to take their study of it more seriously, lest they make a particularly poor _guess_ and take out half of the room in the process." He watched as Harry pulled up more into himself at his words, his thin arms holding his legs against his chest tightly with a strength they didn't seem possible of, given their size.

"In addition, I suspect that your mention of a time where you tried to ask for help was not in reference to my class, but rather a point in your younger years. Harry, will you trust me enough to tell me?"

At his carefully phrased question, the boy scooted closer against Severus, as though trying to draw strength from the older man just from touching him. Severus responded by draping an arm around his SLOB and pulling him in just that much further. The boy leaned his head and rested it on Severus's chest as he did so.

It wasn't all that cold in Severus's bedroom, but he could feel the coldness of the boy's skin through his sleeve. The shrunken knit shirt from his closet was still in his other hand; so after asking the boy to sit up for a moment, he pulled it over the boy's head and helped him to put it on, before pulling him back to his side and draping his arm around him once more.

"Does it fit you adequately?" He asked, looking down at the small bundle seated up against him.

"It's nice. I like it, Severus," Harry said with a small grin as he added the man's name on, apparently remembering that he had been given permission to use it.

"Then you may keep it," he answered, noticing quite by chance that the shirt he was wearing that day was quite similar in style and color to the one he had just put on the boy.

The boy smiled and then scooted himself a tiny bit into Severus's lap, causing the man to smirk at the child's non-verbal wish. He decided that now would not be the time to point out the usefulness of Harry asking for things. Instead, he leaned over and picked up the boy's small weight, before turning him around against him in his traditional position.

He felt the tension from Harry's muscles drain away at being held once more, and he felt contentment softly bubble through them both. He wondered if he would have to prompt the boy to tell his story, but quickly put it out of his mind as Harry began explaining.

"Once, after I had just started school, I got in trouble for not sitting down and doing what I was told like all of the other kids. The teacher finally got so sick of it that she just picked me up and plunked me down into my seat. Apparently she thought I was just being difficult or spoiled or something, when I began howling after she dumped me down. So she sent me to the principal's office." The boy said, taking a break from his story to breathe in a few shuddery and ragged breaths.

From what Severus could see from his vantage point, Harry's eyes were squeezed tightly behind his glasses from the emotion that was being brought up in his retelling of the tale.

"I have a morose suspicion I know where you're going with this account, Harry, but I would still like you to continue on when you feel that you can." He said, rubbing the boy's back gently with his free hand.

"I showed up and the woman at the front desk said that I had to take a seat and wait quietly for a bit until the man got out of a meeting with another troublemaker." Here, Harry's entire frame began shuddering with what likely was years of unspent emotional turmoil.

Severus only continued to hold him and rub those same circles into his back. He understood the very real need for the boy to be able to express his grief over the cruelties that he had been forced to withstand most of his life, without being told to _'grow up_ ' or to ' _quit acting like a baby_.'"

He knew that the child needed validation that the pain that he had suffered had been real, and _had been wrong_ ; otherwise, he would never completely manage to get past the unresolved issues from his past.

And so he listened to the boy quietly and let him say what he needed to say, before allowing himself to speak in return.

"I begged her to let me just stand and I promised her that I would be as silent as the early dawn. She blinked at me in surprise, I guess, at my comparison, before nodding and agreeing to let me stand." He said, his arms tightening ever so slightly around Severus's body as he neared the critical part of the story.

"When I finally went in to Mr. Stilling's office, she came in with me and explained what I had said. See, the meeting he'd been in had gone on for more than two hours, but I had kept still and completely silent like a statue the entire time, barely blinking. She told him about that too, and I saw some kinda look go between them then." The boy cleared his throat softly for a second before continuing.

"She went back out to the waiting room section, and he closed the door behind her. I can't remember what he looked like, because I never looked at his face. He was wearing a big thick b-b-belt with a heavy cl-clasp." Harry's shudders turned from full body shakes to tiny spasmodic snaps of tension, moving randomly throughout his body in haphazard patterns, like popcorn as it first begins popping.

Severus felt the quavering in his body become more pronounced with that change, and likewise more vicious, as it warred with Harry's obvious need to maintain some kind of control over his body.

"Relax lad," Severus said, speaking then in an effort to keep the child from working himself into another panic attack, or dangerous release of accidental magic. "Relax son, I've got you. You are safe now. Just let your feelings out, child. They want to be let out. Can't you see that they are trying to eat you alive from the inside out?" He asked soothingly, rocking them both gently.

The boy's body tensed several times before the explosion of tears began, but Severus continued to murmur the same things in his ear, allowing the boy a chance to safely and freely express his pain and fear and anger for what was likely the first time in his life.

Through the tears, the boy gasped and stuttered out the rest of the story to Severus. He told him how the man had asked him about _why_ he couldn't sit down, and he told Severus that no one had ever thought to ask _him_ about why he was doing something. They always had yelled first and then punished afterwards, leaving him to figure out why, as was usually the case. His uncle hadn't ever allowed him to ask for what he needed, _let alone_ ask for _help_.

So even though it had been literally beaten into him from the beginning that he " _did not speak about what happened to him_ , _'cause Uncle Vernon said that no one gave a damn about a little nasty piece of shit like me_ ," the boy had sobbed violently through that bit of the explanation, and Severus had held him tighter still, rocking him, only now with the boy's head at the base of his neck, where he could wrap the child tightly under his chin and arms, in protection against the outpouring of acidic memories.

 _Likely to be just the first of many eventual nightmarish accounts of his relatives' sadistic actions against him_ , he thought darkly.

The boy told Severus about the tight fist of control that his uncle had raised him with, but explained that Mr. Stilling's question to him been so unusual to hear that he had faltered on the usual answers he was supposed to use, and instead had taken a chance with the truth.

The evening before that fateful day, he had been making his way carefully across the kitchen to begin working on the mountain of dirty dishes after dinner, only to be surprised by his monstrous whale of a cousin on the way. His cousin had squirted him with his monster super soaker gun, spraying him in the eyes, causing Harry to duck out the way, only to fall and slip in the mess the other boy had made. His cousin had proceeded to spray the front of Harry's pants, and then laugh loudly to his father about how Harry had wet himself in the kitchen floor like a dog.

"That was before I learned to run from Uncle Vernon. I still thought that if I could follow his rules, and b-be g-g-g-good enough, they would eventually l-lo-love m-me," Harry said, no longer crying as hard, but his voice still burning with bitterness and anger, as well as across the charmed necklace around Severus's neck.

"Harry, please listen to me when I tell you not to direct your anger at yourself for trying to be loved. As I told you last night, and will say again, you _are_ worthy of love. Your sorry excuse for relatives did not deserve the chance to have someone as loveable as you in their lives."

Severus felt the boy's tears begin anew as he processed what Severus had said.

"If you do not feel that you can currently tell me what your uncle did to you afterwards, don't make yourself sick in trying to do so, child." He said after giving him some time to cry quietly.

"No. I can do it," the boy said stubbornly a moment later, less shakily.

Harry explained the pure fury that had been in his uncle's face at hearing Dudley's words. The man had taken Harry down right then and there, beating him savagely against his bare flesh until he had bled, before eventually passing out. After awaking, he had been made to clean up the floor and then continue on to do the dishes even though it was nearly midnight by the time he had regained consciousness.

He had told all of this to the principal, but the man made one critical error in his handling of the situation. He did not have the injuries verified by the school nurse or anyone else there. From there, everyone had turned against him; his uncle and aunt had been called in, only to tell Mr. Stillings and anyone else who would listen that Harry had always been a liar, and was constantly doing things to get others in trouble. It might have still worked out even for all of that, if his teacher hadn't rallied on the side of his guardians.

"Dudley and I were in the same class," Harry said, yawning in Severus's arms by that point. "Dudley was always pulling stuff and blaming it on me. He threatened the other kids too, to the point that they would go along with his 'Harry hunting' schemes, just so they were safe." He yawned again, and Severus reached into his pocket for his wand to quickly cast a cleansing charm, followed by a drying charm on his shirt, so the surface would not be uncomfortable for the boy to lean against.

"After we got home that day, Uncle Vernon picked me up by one hand and threw me into my cupboard for the next two days straight. I heard him tell Petunia that if they were lucky, I'd die in there, and then all they'd have left of me would be a bad smell to . . . get rid . . . of." The child had cried himself out and had fallen asleep as a result.

Severus, for his part, continued to sit in that same position for more than hour, processing all that Harry had said, trying to determine an acceptable plan of action for both the child, as well as the torturous ghouls of his past.


	26. Relative Concerns

"I will _see_ my son," Molly Weasley told Poppy firmly from where she sat within the older woman's office.

"Molly, while I'm quite certain your request is most heartfelt, I'm not quite sure that you understand what you are asking," Poppy said, trying to be gentle.

"He is my _child_. Perhaps you may be right concerning the rest of his siblings, and even his father, but _I_ am his _mother_. We are a part of one another. _Please_. He is my youngest son, and now that he is in desperate need, how can you dare to deny my request?" Molly said, tears glittering, albeit unshed, within her wide eyes.

Poppy sighed, having already known that something like this would come to bear, sooner than later. Although it is far sooner than she would have hoped for, there is still something to be said for Molly's heartbroken plea.

 _Yes, but heartbroken is not defeated, as I fear she will become afterwards_.

"Molly," she said, trying to give her the full truth of the situation, without giving her the boy, "how will you feel if I let you see him, and he does not respond to your administrations? We have not yet determined what the cause is of his delirium and consequent aggressive behaviors. I cannot, nor will I, make the possibly false statement that he will definitely get better," she said.

Throughout the years that she had worked at Hogwarts, she had seen to the care of all of Molly's immediate family, including the woman herself. Poppy knew the value that Molly put on each one of her children's lives, and somehow the idea of having to show her one of those lives in perhaps in a permanently downwards spiraling progression was almost too much to bear.

 _For either of us,_ she thought sadly.

"Poppy, it makes no difference. If he is to die, then let him not do it _alone_. I saw him into this world; if necessary, I will see him out." Molly's face crumpled for a moment, but she pulled herself together with a deep shuddering breath. Her eyes shone with infinite resolve, and it was in that moment that Poppy gave in to her plea, if only silently.

"Now, you _will_ show me to my baby. Please." Molly said, drawing herself together by force of willpower alone. Her voice was ragged, but it was also defiant.

And Poppy knew that there was more that she could say in order to delay the inevitable.

"Very well Molly," she said sadly. "I will take you to him."

…

The castle, after creating an extra room in the Potion master's quarters on its own, decided that it _liked_ being of help to others, and therefore created another room for the infirmary for the sole purpose of giving privacy to more serious cases, like the boy presently under the current healer's care.

All of this, the castle had decided to share with one Severus Snape, who in turn, relayed the news to the much flabbergasted, although pleased, Poppy Pomfrey.

It was to this room that the castle watched Poppy slowly lead the other woman to.

…

Outside the room that had only recently come into existence, Poppy stopped and turned to look at Molly seriously.

"No, you won't talk me out of it now," Molly said, shaking her head, misunderstanding the reason for Poppy's hesitation.

"That's not why I stopped," Poppy said seriously. "I wanted to offer some advice before you go in."

"Poppy, you do not have to warn me about the horrors of what I might see. I have, after all, been an order member for nearly as long as you have been."

"Hush child, and listen to your old Poppy." Poppy told her sternly, but not unkindly.

Molly shut her mouth.

"In other cases as serious as this one, I have witnessed both good and bad things occur with the introduction of a new element, such as yourself. I have seen a variety of methods employed that have resulted in unforeseen changes that no one could have foretold. Now," she said, raising a hand as she saw Molly start to speak, "the difficulty here is that there is no _one_ correct or right way for proceeding. However, the cases that did have positive results—even if they were just short term in nature—came about because the people involved in them _allowed their hearts to guide their actions_. Do you understand me child?"

Molly nodded her head solemnly.

Poppy opened the door.

…

"Sev'rus?" He heard the boy sleepily ask from his position within his arms.

"Yes child?" Severus responded gently.

"Am thirsty," the boy mumbled, although not quite awake following his impromptu two hour nap at the conclusion of their last discussion.

"And hungry, I suspect, if those sounds from your belly indicate anything," Severus said with a fond smirk.

"Yeah," the boy agreed, slowly becoming aware of the world around him.

"Let's go investigate what the house elves have in store for us today, then," Severus said, standing up slowly, the partially awake child still draped safely within the safe barrier of his arms.

As Severus approached the table, he asked the boy if he would prefer to stay where he was or adjourn to a chair.

From the boy's quiet poking into the top of his shoulder, he assumed that the boy wished to stay within the protection of his arms.

"Then I think it would be best for both of us if I turned you around." This he did so shortly after sitting, arranging the still relaxed boy in his lap so that they were both facing the table.

"Jayda?" Severus asked to the empty room.

A house elf appeared beside them with a pop and then a curtsy.

"Sirs?" She chirruped delicately. "Be you wantings some lunch then?"

"Yes. Perhaps something involving little need for silverware?" Severus said, eyeing the half-sprawled boy in his lap carefully.

"Right away sirs. Jayda can do that in a jiffy," she said with a happy smile, and then with another pop, she was gone again.

A moment later, the food appeared on the table, the boy's stomach rumbling interestedly as though in response.

Severus was pleased by the choices of food items before him, happy that the house elf had understood his request. In the middle of the table sat an assortment of fruit, the apples looking and smelling especially enticing. On the plate in front of them, there was an assortment of sandwiches, offering fitting choices for the both of them. To the side of their plate sat a small bowl of baby carrots, and behind that sat a small plate of cookies, for _after_ their meal, as he told the boy in no uncertain terms.

Also present was an entire jug of pumpkin juice, and a pot of steaming tea; the boy, not surprisingly, asked for the pumpkin juice, while he himself chose the hot tea.

The child drank down nearly an entire glass of the orange liquid before pausing to take a breath. Severus was tempted to tell him to slow down, but suspected that after the outpouring of emotion that had occurred earlier that day, it was likely that the boy was quite dehydrated.

Interestingly enough, after finished his cup of juice, Harry declined having another cup and asked for tea instead. When Severus asked him if he needed sugar or milk, he saw with interest that the boy resolutely shook his head 'no,' choosing to drink his tea in the same manner as Severus himself did. The boy had drunk tea with him before, and had always taken at least two lumps of sugar with it, _if not more_ , he thought with a carefully concealed shudder.

Severus did not question his abrupt change in palate, but instead asked him for choice in sandwiches.

As he had suspected, the boy asked for whatever he was getting. Privately, Severus wondered if he should just pick peanut butter for the shock value, but he decided that Harry would soon know that Severus's patience for peanut butter was meager at best, and decided not to push it. Instead, he chose to split two sandwiches with the boy and see which one was devoured the quickest. He picked a toasted BLT and a turkey and mustard on rye, giving the boy half of each and working on the other halves himself.

Given that he was generally a lefty when it came to eating and writing, Severus arranged it so the boy was propped against his right side, leaving his left arm free.

"I thought that you always stirred your potions with your right hand?" The boy asked him curiously after finally noticing that they were eating with different hands.

"A good potions master does better if they can learn to be more or less ambidextrous." He said sagely.

"Does it matter for you which hand you hold your wand in?"

"Not anymore," Severus admitted, quietly pleased by the boy's intrigue with him.

"Wow." The boy breathed. "Why don't they teach that in our classes then?" He asked, taking a tentative bite out of the BLT.

"For students, especially beginners, it is hard enough to get them to make _anything_ happen with their dominant hand, let alone trying with their non-dominant."

"But I thought," the boy's face crunched up as he dug through his memories, "I thought that different parts of the brain controlled different sides of the body, right?"

"The research does seem to indicate that, yes. Why?" He asked, quietly wondering where the conversation was headed.

"Well, say your dominant hand is your right hand, like me," he nodded at the hand carefully holding his sandwich, "that would mean that your left side of your brain is controlling your wand work. If I'm remembering correctly," the boy said, looking up at Severus's face with trepidation, before nibbling nervously on his sandwich and falling silent.

"I have no doubt that your memory is very good with subjects you find particularly fascinating," Severus said, leaving off the unspoken, _unlike with potions_.

The boy grinned in understanding, proving his advanced talent for perceptive reasoning yet again.

"Um, well if I remember correctly, then the left half of the brain is the ordered, logical side, as opposed to the right half, which is the creative, free thinking part." The boy paused, taking another, bigger bite as he thought about how to say what he was thinking. A moment after swallowing a drink of the tea, his face lit up excitedly, before jumping back into his topic.

"I was thinking one day about whether I was more left brained or right brained. There was this news show on the telly that I got to watch, because Dudley had fallen asleep on the couch after some movie he'd been watching before that. Anyways," the boy shook his head, trying to move past the image of Dudley, asleep or not. "Anyways," he repeated, "the show mentioned the idea that most people were usually largely one or the other, and if you could figure out which one you were, then you were better able to work with your strengths, as well as knowing to be more careful around your weaknesses," he said, finishing off the BLT in one bite.

While he chewed contentedly, Severus reached for the carrots and put a few on the plate as well, as a mild suggestion.

"When you said that you could do wand work with either hand then, it made me wonder about what if someone was right brained, but they were also right handed? Wouldn't that mean that they would have better access to their magic if they used their wand with their left hand then?" The boy asked, reaching for a carrot absentmindedly and crunching it loudly while looking at him quietly.

Severus was startled by the question that the child had posed, especially after hearing him reason it out as thoroughly as he had. With the boy's small stature, it was often difficult to imagine him as a boy of twelve, but now, having heard the question just asked of him, it was difficult to imagine him as _only_ a boy of twelve.

"That is a very interesting hypothesis you have just put forth. I find your reasoning and accompanying information to be most thought provoking," Severus answered honestly. "I am aware that the professors who teach the rudimentary wand techniques tell students to put hold their wands in their _wand hands_ , but since no explanation is given as to what that means, the assumption is generally made that one's wand hand _is_ your dominant hand."

Severus's mind began whirling at the possible implications of what the boy had just deduced. As such, he missed the adulation shining out of the boy's eyes at the man's uncharacteristic use of direct compliments towards him.

It was those compliments which raised the boy's confidence enough to make his next few comments.

"Severus?" He asked; drawing the man out of the reverie he had fallen into.

"Yes Harry?"

"What if, well what if the reason that some people have problems with certain spells is that their processing of those spells takes part in another part of their brain? From what I've read, it would make sense that if they could learn to do those spells with their wand in their other hand, from there it shouldn't matter which hand they used, because first of all, learning creates new pathways in the brain, and second, just the knowledge that they _knew_ they could already work the spell would help them to make it happen."

Simply put, Severus was more than a little stunned and mesmerized by the clear intellect sitting in front of him, just upon his lap.

"Harry, when did you get to be so intelligent?" Severus found himself asking.

Although his question could have clearly been taken as an insult, Harry did not interpret it as such. It was obvious to Harry that the mere _fact_ that Severus had _recognized_ _him_ as an intelligent being was of central importance, regardless of how he had made his statement.

Severus found himself immeasurably relieved when the boy just turned and grinned up at him, before surprising him with an impetuous embrace.

When they parted, he was to be surprised again as Harry leaned in once more and kissed his cheek, before whispering, "thank you," into the man's ear.

"For what?" He asked the child softly.

"For making me real," the boy whispered back, before shyly turning back around and starting on his other half a sandwich with a new zeal.

"You are most welcome, Harry," he said thickly, briefly pulling the boy in closer to lightly press a kiss against his head, before resuming his own lunch.

 _Most welcome_.

…

Molly walked into a nightmare with Poppy walking closely behind her, in case she should need support, physical or otherwise.

Her baby boy was in anguish, as he fought against the magical restraints that held him against the bed.

"Why is he restrained?" She quietly asked the older woman behind her.

"Self-injurious behavior," Poppy said simply, obviously not caring to go into extensive details at the moment.

 _Oh little one!_ She thought miserably.

She wanted to go up to him, but Poppy had suggested she take it slowly, letting him get used to her presence as she became reacquainted with what he was like now.

His lips were no longer cracked and bleeding, but there were bite marks clearly visible in his bottom lip, likely due to his unmanageable anger and misery at not getting the drugs that he had undoubtedly been actively taking before coming here. Overall, his face was very difficult for her to look at, and she was grateful that Poppy had given her the advice that she had.

Although it was certain that he was being kept clean and fed here under Poppy's more than capable hands, it was hard to see that based on just his appearance. His hair was drenched with sweat, matting it down wildly around his desperately thin, pale face. She found herself wondering if he were actually paler than Severus now, something which she previously would have deemed impossible.

There were dark circles around his eyes, indicating that his rest had been less than adequate as of late. Stepping a bit closer, she found that she was able to see his fingers in the moments when his hands were not clenched. To her dismay, they appeared to be bandaged tightly.

 _Likely from more self-injurious behavior_ , she thought bitterly towards everyone around her, but especially at whoever was responsible. If given the chance, she would kill them herself.

She watched with increasing concern as her child began howling like a wounded feral animal, convulsing wildly against the bonds that kept him in place, while his eyes rolled madly in his head. She watched as his body defied gravity, lifting his midsection briefly into the air, the tendons appearing starkly evident in his neck from the effort.

She couldn't bear the sight of his suffering alone while she might possibly be able to do something about it. Without another thought, she shook off Poppy's hands and strode forwards towards him.

"Hush my baby boy, mummy's here now. You aren't alone anymore my darling baby." She cooed softly, even as he continued to screech wildly. It didn't faze her; she _wouldn't_ _let it_ faze her. If this was the way it had to be, then that was okay with her. They would face whatever was going to happen together. She wouldn't leave him alone now in his greatest moment of need.

With a few softly spoken words to her wand, she quickly created a clean soft washcloth, just like the kind she had always used on her babies when they had been sick. She gently used it to clean the sweat and dried spit off of his face, neck and brow, before spelling it clean and adding a charm to keep it cool and moist. She used it against his forehead, pressing it gently there with a lightweight sticking charm.

"See now, isn't that so much better sweet baby?" She said, carefully touching his still gaunt cheek with her hand.

She continued speaking to him in low, soft tones, the same as she had done when he had woken up with a nightmare, or had come running to her, his eyes full of tears after falling and scraping his knees. She saw his eyes dart to look at her a few times as he paused to recover from his most recent outburst. It hurt her to see him so distraught, his mind obviously confused as he continued to sneak glances at her.

"Mummy's here, mummy's here. Mummy's not going to leave, my sweetest child, my darling baby boy. You are safe now; mummy's got you." She said, keeping up the litany of comforting words going effortlessly, as she continued to smooth his hair and stroke his cheek.

Although he did not show any indications that he recognized her, it was evident that he found her presence somewhat soothing, if only unconsciously, for within an hour of listening to her soft voice and feeling her loving touches across his skin, the thrashing of his body dropped off significantly, as had his mindless howls of misery.

Furthermore, after another hour of experiencing the comforting presence of his mother, Ron managed the completely unexpected by falling into a deep natural sleep, the first he had managed on his own since finding his way back.

In response, she kissed his cheek reverently, before wearily taking the chair that Poppy had provided for her nearly an hour earlier.


	27. Muddling Through

Although Ron hadn't been able to remember why the woman standing at his bedside was familiar to him, he had still managed to be comforted by her nonetheless. From within his own muddled consciousness, he decided that his mind's recognition of her was irrelevant, since his body had reacted so positively to her.

For a short period of time before he had allowed himself to be delivered into unconsciousness, he had even wondered to himself if she might be the girl he was initially looking for. If nothing else, he felt that it might be safe for him to ask her if who and where Hermione Granger might be.

It was of little importance to him that he no longer could remember his initial purpose for finding her in the first place.

Perhaps she would be able to tell him, provided he ever met her.

…

Poppy had been amazed at the incredible effect that Molly's presence had produced in Ron. Although he had been unsure of her upon her initial appearance next to him, his trepidation had quickly disappeared as he slowly was lulled by her actions.

After falling asleep late that afternoon, he further surprised her and the other healers involved, as he continued to sleep on through the night and into the next morning. Poppy had offered to watch over him as he slept, in order to give Molly the same chance to rest, but she had declined, saying that she hadn't wanted him to awake without her.

It turned out to be just as well, because later that day, Severus contacted her via floo, and invited her for dinner, mentioning that Harry had asked to see her, because he had needed to expound on something he had previously not mentioned in regards to Ron.

Intrigued by both the invitation itself, as well as Harry's sudden desire to speak with her, she had accepted the offer.

Upon arriving, she was taken aback by the similarities in clothing worn by both Severus and Harry. They both were wearing black pants, grey tops and simple, yet stylish, black vests.

"My my," she said in appreciation to them both, "don't we look nice together." She smiled benevolently at them both. Unsurprisingly, Severus pretended not to hear her, but Harry positively beamed at the praise. She found herself wanting to see him smile more often, as it changed his outer countenance completely.

"I had planned on our going for a basic shopping expedition to expand the lad's clothing options, but given the sudden downpour of snow and wind upon the outside world, I felt it might be better to postpone," Severus said dourly.

"Yes, the blizzard changed the plans for many of the people around here," she said in agreement. "Professor Sprout even was forced to cancel her afternoon classes."

"I'm sure her students were pleased about that, given that their holidays started just that much sooner," Severus said, sneeringly.

Just then, Jayda appeared in the middle of the room with her traditional pop of sound and subsequent curtsy.

"Sirs and Ma'am, Professor Snape tolds me to announce whens dinner was to be served. If it's good for yous, then dinners be served now," she said, bowing and exiting the room. Only a second later, the table was abruptly loaded down with food.

Severus nodded his head, indicating they should go ahead and eat. As was his custom, he waited for her to take her seat before sitting himself. She noticed that the boy carefully watched the older man's actions before mimicking them to the best of his ability as well. Severus noticed her interest and quirked an eyebrow at her, before shaking his head ever so slightly, indicating a later explanation.

Dinner was good, but she continued to be amused by Harry's choices in food items, as well as table manners. She was sitting across from Severus, with Harry in the middle of them. Not only did the boy choose the exact foods that Severus picked, but he also arranged them in the same order on his plate. In addition, he also forewent the pumpkin juice, instead choosing hot tea and then taking it exactly the way the older man drank it.

Severus was clearly aware of the boy's copycat behaviors, and it was obvious to her that even though he was trying to make her think he was annoyed by the child's actions, it was also quite apparent that he was pleased by the boy's open admiration and desire to be like him.

It was only after the table had been cleared, and they had adjourned to the adjacent sitting area, that she turned to Harry to ask about his wish to speak with her regarding Ron.

"Well," he said, glancing at Severus quickly before continuing, and getting a nod in return, "actually I wanted to tell the both of you what h-happened the day that Ron uh, broke my nose." He said nervously.

Severus, to her continuing surprise, reached out and voluntarily took the boy's hand in an open gesture of support, something he had always tended to eschew, at least in all the years she had known him.

 _The day Ron broke his nose,_ she humphed to herself darkly, knowing that there had been a lot more to it than just _that_.

"That was the day Ron nearly choked Draco Malfoy to death," the boy continued, now whispering, undoubtedly remembering the shock from what had nearly transpired that day in their classroom. "But I guess you remember _that_ part, right?"

"I do," she affirmed solemnly. "What I don't understand is what prevented him from completing the action," she said, looking intently at the boy.

"Prof-I mean, Severus had stepped into his office to get something when it was going on. And that's when Malfoy and Ron started up; you know, throwing insults back and forth like they always did. Only," he said, looking thoughtful, "Malfoy was acting kinda squirrelly; like he was actually really sad, but trying to cover it up, you know? And Ron, he just turned _awful_ , and started telling him that he had heard Malfoy was changing his name to something girly, before going on about how Malfoy's father was gonna make him change his name so that his father wouldn't have to be connected with a freak like him anymore."

Surreptitiously, she saw Severus briefly squeeze the boy's hand, before reaching inside his pocket and silently handing Harry a dark blue handkerchief to wipe away the tears that had suddenly begun falling from his interminably saddened eyes.

"And _then,_ " Harry said, his voice rising in volume as he reached an emotionally fraught section of the story, "Ron just hauled him up and _threw_ him over their cauldron onto the floor like it was nothing! I'd never seen him do _anything_ like that before— _never_ ," he repeated with vehemence. He stared up at her with tears shining brightly in his eyes.

"It's likely that he was already in the throes of the drug by that point, and that it contributed to his aggressive behavior, as well as the increased strength that you witnessed." She said softly to him, trying to validate the aberrant memory of his friend.

Harry sniffled, only to have Severus nudge him with his knee and point to the handkerchief still wound tightly in the fingers of his free hand.

"Oops. Sorry Severus." The boy said apologetically, embarrassed to have had to be reminded.

Once Harry had made use of the blue cloth, he sighed and went back to his account.

"When Draco hit the ground, he immediately tried to sit up, but he must have broken something or sprained something, 'cause he just groaned in pain instead." Harry said, looking questioningly at her.

"Apparently when Mr. Malfoy's body hit the floor, he did so with his leg under him, causing him to severely sprain his ankle upon impact." She said by way of explanation.

"Ouch." The boy said, looking at his fingers awkwardly.

Poppy glanced briefly at Severus, only to find his face dark and foreboding, though what precisely about, Poppy was unsure.

"That's when Ron picked him up off the floor and just started ch-choking him, like by hand, physically, I mean," the boy rambled a bit before trailing off disjointedly. "And that wasn't even the worst part," he whispered, looking at Severus, fresh tears appearing in his eyes.

"Explain what you mean by that," the man said, looking calmly back at the boy, his previous fury completely wiped clean from his face.

"He said, R-Ron s-s-said something like, like Malfoy should try begging for his life, but Ron wouldn't say something like that. He wouldn't," the boy cried, slumping miserably against Severus.

Poppy decided then and there that something had definitely shifted in the last few days of their enforced isolation together, for what Severus did next completely wiped clean any old preconceptions she had previously held about what kind of man he was.

When Harry had slumped against Severus's side, he had simply lifted his arm around the boy and pulled him sideways into his lap. There, the boy latched his arms around the man's neck and cried unabashedly against his shoulder. Severus's arms held the boy securely and safely in place, while he leaned down and whispered soft words into Harry's ear. Soon the sniffles were dying down and Harry's control had begun returning, but he made no move to leave the protection of his position, nor did Severus make any indications that he should.

Poppy managed to close her gaping mouth sometime before they turned back to look at her, but felt sure that Severus, at least, could tell from the look on her face that she didn't know what to make of the display she had just witnessed.

"I saw Malfoy looking around at everyone, just—just begging with his eyes," the boy continued slowly, but distantly as he remembered the event in question more vividly than he might prefer. "So I looked around too and s-saw that the other Slytherins, his supposed friends, they were mostly just either ignoring at him, or laughing at him. I l-looked next to me, wh-where Hermione was sitting, and her eyes," the boy swallowed painfully, "her eyes," he whispered again, burrowing in further against Severus's body, "they weren't sad or angry," he looked back up at Severus's calm demeanor, "they were just _dead_ , like she was dead, like Ron was dead, and they were just waiting to make Draco d-d-dead t-t-t-too," he stammered miserably.

Poppy saw that Severus's face had gone curiously dark once more, but the boy either didn't notice or understood the reasons behind it.

"That was one of the absolutely worst parts, 'cause there we were, a class of _students_ , and we were watching our classmate just stand up there calmly killing someone in front of us, and n-no one was saying anything about it," he said, his eyes wide in his horrified face, as he continued to stare at Severus.

Poppy felt as though he had probably forgotten her presence, but was not insulted by it.

"I trust you intervened then, yes?" Severus asked him gently.

"Yes sir," Harry said miserably.

"What happened child?" He asked.

"I told him that I thought he ought to just p-put him down, and when he didn't seem to hear me, I repeated myself. He looked at me like he had never seen me before, just before something seemed to click in his face, and he said 'Just put him down?' like it was a concept that he hadn't even con-considered." Harry stopped and wrapped his arms around himself, abruptly chilled after the letdown of emotions.

Severus whispered a quick heating charm then and the boy relaxed marginally.

"And I, so I said back, I said something like, 'Yeah, just put him down,' you know, all calm like, as though we were just talking about what we were having for lunch, only there was this life that was slowly being extinguished _right there_ in the room with us." Harry closed his eyes for a moment, seemingly gathering strength, before continuing.

She watched Severus lightly reach out and touch Harry's hair, before softly touching his cheek, assuring himself that the child was truly there, safe with him.

"And then he just dropped him and Draco's body hit the floor with a big THUD, and that's when you happened to come back into the room, before getting Poppy too, on account of how serious it was. So then, you two left with him, and people just stood around, not knowing what to do I guess, but then Hermione left, she didn't even say goodbye, she just left, and most of the others went too. Only, see, right after Ron dropped him, I heard a couple of people throw up, after seeing what nearly happened, I suppose it just hit them badly," he stopped, taking a deep breath, trying to slow himself down, aware that he had begun rambling, nearly out of control.

"I am right here, lad. I promise you that I am not going anywhere," Severus said in the silence.

Harry's eyes were still closed, but he nodded in response, showing that he had heard the words.

Poppy secretly wondered if _she_ had heard the words that had just supposedly come out of Severus's mouth.

 _Maybe I'm really asleep,_ she thought half-jokingly to herself, although she knew the truth.

"I happened to look back then, and I saw Ron standing back there with Zabini, just _laughing_ about something, and I heard Malfoy's name, and assumed that was who they were making fun of. Ron nearly killed him and then he goes back and laughs about it?" Harry opened his eyes and they shone with fresh anger.

"I went back there and told him off for it and why I felt that way. I told him there were better ways to go about things than that." Harry said ambiguously.

Poppy felt sure that Severus would have the boy go back and explain what he had meant by a few of those phrases, but Severus didn't, making her feel as though she had missed a vital piece of the puzzle.

"And then I punched him." Harry said, looking up at Severus apologetically.

"Admirable self-restraint," Severus said grimly. "I fear that had anyone else been in your shoes, Mr. Weasley would have suffered far greater than just a physical strike."

 _Anyone else—like_ you _Severus?_

"Right after that, I heard Neville yell a warning out to duck, and I turned around and had to throw myself onto the floor out of the way of the chair that Zabini had just sent flying at my head. Ron started laughing at me, for cleaning the floor, he said." The boy scowled deeply, doing an impressive imitation of one of Severus's own dark expressions.

"So I jumped up to hit him again, and threw us both to the floor as Zabini cast another chair at us. That's when Neville had the idea of turning out the lights, thinking that it would at least keep Zabini from knocking me flat with a chair. Though, it turned out that Ron didn't have the same problem," he said, speaking in a monotone voice, his eyes somewhat vacant.

 _Oh Harry_.

"It was so dark in there, Severus. The lights from the hallway didn't even seem to make any headway against the darkness. And then Ron he, well he," the boy stopped and pushed his glasses up to rub tiredly at his eyes before dropping them back down and resting his head sideways on Severus's chest.

Severus did not speak, but started rubbing slow circles on the boy's back, gradually relaxing him enough to find his voice.

"He opened his eyes. And I—I've only been scared that bad a few times in my life, Severus." He whispered, looking up into the man's dark fathomless eyes.

"What did you see?" Severus asked quietly, but with a subtly increased level of intensity.

"His eyes—his eyes they were glowing bright green in the dark."

She gasped at his description of the boy _. It might be the key towards finding the original drug._

"I tried to get away, I tried, but Zabini distracted me, by pelting another chair, only this time it was at Neville's head. The sound made me jerk, but I swear I only looked away for a second. When I looked back, Ron was standing over me just like, just like—," he broke off, unable to say what he had been about to say.

Severus only pulled him in tighter, as he continued rubbing those same circles into his taut muscles.

"—he began beating me with the broken leg of a chair. At one point, I thought that he had actually taken my nose off, with one of those hits." The boy was slowly curling in on himself, _likely unconsciously,_ she thought, thinking back to what those diagnostics had found regarding his many years of abuse at the hands of his "family."

"And then," he said, his voice becoming more and more choked, "he just began kicking me, and I tried pushing myself under a chair, but he just kicked me harder, until I was not much more than pulp, it felt like. That's when—," the boy coughed, trying to make his throat open enough to speak, "—that's when he, that's when—," the boy trailed off; unable to say whatever it was that had happened next, but she felt for a dreadful instance that she knew exactly what it was.

…

The child in his lap had turned once more into his SLOB. He could see that the boy desperately needed to tell someone about whatever horrible thing had occurred there in the dark, but at the same time, his body would simply not allow him that chance.

Abruptly the boy stopped trying and began slapping himself in the head, with vicious strokes that left handprints on the surface of his skin. Severus quickly caught the boy's small arms and held them with one hand in his lap, while using his other arm to pull the boy in as far as he could without causing the child any pain. Once more, like the day before, he rested his chin over the top of Harry's head, creating a protective enclave for him to find refuge in and regain his senses safely.

They stayed in that position until he felt the boy's nod. He gradually relaxed his arm and lifted his chin off of his soft hair, pulling back far enough until he could look down at his SLOB carefully, to assess whatever damage he might have done.

"May I release your hands now and trust you not to make further attempts to injure yourself?" He asked sternly, yet calmly.

The boy nodded again, but did not speak; he just continued to stare brightly into Severus's eyes, his eyes desperately begging him for help.

It had occurred to him that the child's wish to speak with the both of them was likely to be due to the sensitive and possibly painful nature of the subject, and the desire not to have to repeat the story unnecessarily. He had thought about that, and likewise about the possible need for him to legilimize the boy at some point.

Now it seemed that the point had arrived, but he didn't dare do it without the child's permission. It seemed that this boy's life had been filled with people doing what they liked with the child, without his permission in any of it. He would not follow in the footsteps of those lesser beings.

"Child," he said, "there is a way that I can see into your mind and discover the truth of your memories without your need to explain them yourself. I can do this, but I will not without your express permission. Is that clear to you?"

Harry was quiet as he pondered the implications of what Severus had said. Finally though, he nodded slowly, seeming to understand their lack of options.

"What do I have to do?" Harry whispered.

"You need just to relax and maintain eye contact with me. Can you do that?" He asked gently, not intending to frighten.

The boy nodded, before taking a deep breath and appearing to focus his energies inwards.

 _Likely a calming method_ , Severus thought interestedly.

When Harry looked back up at him a moment later, he was noticeably more at ease.

"I believe I will have to inquire later more about the nature of what it was you just did," he said, smirking lightly at the boy.

The boy smiled shyly at him, and he found that his heart simultaneously ached and warmed at the sight. And then he felt dread creeping into him as he worriedly looked back into the shockingly green eyes, pushing past the physical and working his way through the child's mind itself. He flitted past the boy's recent recollections with ease, and then probed deeper cautiously. It was no trial to find the correct memory; that day's events had apparently been floating at the forefront of the boy's mind for several days. He slipped into the memory easily, and then proceeded to be horrified as the scene unfolded before his very eyes.

When it was complete, he had every intention of leaving the boy's mind then, but the child's memories continued to pull him in, as though the boy himself had physically grabbed him by the hand and were dragging him closer by force.

He quickly became aware of the desperation underlying the boy's memory as it progressed, but also of the child's very real need to share it with someone who wouldn't use it to betray him.

He forced himself to watch the memory in its entirety. He forced himself to watch as Lucius cruelly manipulated and belittled the child, dragging his spirit into the ground with each thrust of his tongue against the tender parts of the boy's anatomy; falsely encouraging the child's belief that the autonomic physical actions of his body also represented his own hidden desires to be treated in such a despicable fashion.

When he had initially rescued the child, he had flitted briefly over these same memories, but that short observation hadn't shown the true duplicity of Lucius's actions against him nearly as clearly as watching the entire sordid affair had.

He wanted to physically disembowel the man by hand for the actions he had committed against his child.

 _His child?_ He thought wildly at himself, keeping the thought hidden from the boy's mind.

And then without warning, the image before him flickered again and he found his hatred for the Dursleys quickly double and then expand exponentially from there. He watched Petunia washing the much younger child's penis until it bled with the force of her hand and the boy's screams ricocheted off of the bathroom walls around them without ceasing. He watched her became enraged by some petty disturbance involving the boy, and then proceed to _literally pick the boy up by his groin_ , Harry begging her the entire while for _forgiveness_ , only to then throw him in the hated cupboard to moan in pain to himself in the dark for what might have been days. He watched Vernon show the child his own erect penis as a demonstration of what a real man looked like, before viciously kicking the boy in the groin and laughing loudly about the boy's "peanut," and its sorry deformed state.

Memory after memory after memory of similar actions heaped upon the boy who had literally saved the entire wizarding world at only fifteen months of age.

 _This_ was Dumbledore's idea of a safe environment?

 _This_ was the Wizarding world's idea of _thanks_?

Dumbledore would have done better to leave the boy to be raised by a pack of feral sewer rats than those far beyond despicable creatures who still had custody of the boy.

But they wouldn't for very much longer, not if Severus Snape had anything to say about it.

Typically after a long session of being within someone else's mind, he would be exhausted, but this time was nowhere near typical. He removed himself from the boy's mind with a gut full of fury, his eyes burning of their own accord, as he made a wizard's oath to himself that this child's past would be avenged, one way or another.

The boy was wary towards him initially upon his exit of his mind, and he now could see with new clarity that based on experience, the boy thought he would now be rejected for the horrors that _were not his fault_.

_NO._

"Harry," he said, his throat rough with emotion as he continued to process the demented horrors the boy had endured in his past. "I need you to listen very carefully to me now," he said, pulling the boy around so they were looking directly into each other's face.

The boy timidly nodded, clearly unsure of what was to be said to him.

"You did nothing, I repeat _nothing_ to deserve what was done to you from the three parties in question. Your Uncle and Aunt are not _fit_ ," he spat disgustedly, "to be your guardians. They are not fit to be cast into vermin and made to live in the filth of the _sewers_ for the rest of their miserable and degenerate existences. I would gladly take them apart bit by bit for you if I thought it would do something to replace the years that they cruelly stole from you."

"Moreover, the other man? You know whom it is I speak of. He manipulated you by letting you believe that your automatic _physical_ reactions were the same as your internal desires. I _know_ that you did not desire for him to do all that he did to you. _He_ is the _only one at fault_. _You did nothing to deserve his actions;_ do you understand me, beautiful boy? _Nothing_ that happened can in any way, shape or form be blamed on you." He looked into the child's brightly shining green eyes as tears gathered in them unnoticed.

"But S-Severus, I got _h-h-hard_ when he touched me," the boy whispered miserably to him.

"So did I," he whispered back, still not looking away from the child's desperate face to see how Poppy was faring in all was going on before her. "And I did not want it any more than you did child." He said with a bitter voice. "I was nearly ten years older than you, and I could no more control my physical responses than you. I would have had better luck in jumping out the window, believing I could fly, than to believe I could have withstood his treatment of my sensitive person."

He could not remember speaking at such a length with _anyone_ regarding _any_ subject, even his own, save his own childhood years with the dearest Lily; therefore it was incredible that he had managed to say as much as he had to a _child_ regarding a subject that he had buried so deeply within his own soul and spoken to _no others_ in any depth about until that very moment.

He should have been prepared for the way that the boy threw himself into his arms, hugging his neck tightly, but given that his own childhood had been largely bereft of such gestures, he still met each one with slight surprise.

He hugged the child tightly as well, resting his own pounding head against the thin shoulder of the boy who was doing the same against his significantly larger one.

It was strange to think that after years of living largely a solitary existence, he should even _begin to feel_ confident about being about to take care of the life of another.

And yet, it was becoming clearer with each moment that there was someone who shared the same confidence in his abilities, meager though they may be.

A small voice next to his head whispered a short phrase next to his ear, that following Lily's untimely death, he had thought never to hear the likes of ever again.

"I love you."


	28. The Castle

The castle had always liked Severus Snape.

The castle had always liked Minerva McGonagall.

The castle had always liked Molly Weasley.

The castle had always liked watching its children roam its halls.

The castle used to like Dumbledore, but as of late found the man to be more annoying than Filch's cat, when in heat.

It knew that it was a lucky castle to be inhabited by so many interesting occupants, even if it did have to put up with Dumbledore. It knew from its past conversations with various of its denizens that other castles weren't nearly so lucky. It felt sorry for what it thought of as its brothers and sisters, who lived out their days alone and bereft of joy and, laughter.

Therefore, when it started becoming increasingly clear that the headmaster was no longer doing his duties, as stated in the first ever charter drawn up between the first ever headmaster and the castle, then it knew that something had to be done. Therefore, by the time Harry Potter first arrived at its gates, it had been pulling away bit by bit for nearly ten years.

Shortly thereafter, or so it felt to the castle, when it had been forced to witness the atrocities that Lucius had performed on three of its little ones, well that was when it realized that bit by bit was no longer good enough. In the words of some of the older children, bit by bit "sucked arse."

It had been responsible for the magical binding of Harry Potter and Severus Snape. It had watched both closely that year and it had decided to help out when it had become clear that each did much better in the other's company.

The castle had long been worried about its potions master, ever since the child had walked through its hallways. It had always felt that there were great things inside the small creature, if only they could be coaxed out somehow.

And now it seemed to be happening. If the castle could have done a pirouette without anyone noticing, it would have, it was so happy. In lieu of that, however, it gave Severus a new room for the boy to stay in, once they were more settled. It gave Poppy a new room leading off of the infirmary, to put the other boy, so he could heal safely.

Now though, the castle needed a new friend. Part of the reason that all headmasters were to bind the castle to them was so the castle would always have someone to talk with, for at least a little bit each week, lest it get bored and start making odd things happen.

It didn't currently consider itself bored, but it feared that it was heading in that direction. Plus, there was the little problem of what Dumbledore was _doing_ in his newfound free time. The castle didn't like it, and as it had only recently realized, it no longer had to always put up with things it didn't like, especially when one of its children were involved.

Feeling the whim to bother someone, it opened its awareness to what Dumbledore was currently up to from within his quarters.

 _Oh good,_ it thought. _Sleeping,_ it smirked, trying to make it feel like the kind Severus Snape did. It was hard with no mirror and no face, but it still thought it had pulled it off rather well.

" _Dumbledore?"_ It asked hopefully.

Nothing.

Twenty years before, Dumbledore would have never ignored one of its requests to speak. He might have asked to postpone a conversation, but he never ignored the castle.

 _Not like now,_ the castle thought sourly to itself.

The castle was magical, like its people. It was built by people with magic, but the magic had come from before the people, and the castle was made of things that came _before the people_. It knew that magic was more than spells and wands. Those were just adaptations of the true spirit of the magical world itself.

Those so-called pure blooded wizards who sought to rid the world of their muggle counterparts were blind to how things really worked. Muggles, albeit technically non-magical in their own way, were still made from things of the earth itself, which was magical in an older deeper way.

The castle still talked with its dirt mother from time to time—every five hundred years or so—dependent on how much effort she'd needed to put into her spring cleaning that go around. It explained to the castle about what people would have referred to as the "mechanics" of the systems of magic.

Muggles were similar to the precious stones and rocks that made up the composition of the earth. They were elements that interacted with other elements to make new things happen; some elements interacted better than others.

The "pure-bloods" were fooling themselves by not involving themselves with the muggles. Not only did mere _involvement_ with their "non-magical" counterparts help them to have better access to the deep magic of the earth, but intermarriage with muggles helped to keep innate magical abilities fresher, as well as produce children with closer ties to the elements, increasing their powers in turn.

How else could two supposedly non-magical folk create a gifted witch like Hermione Granger?

The castle spent a lot of time listening and a lot of time thinking, and with Dumbledore's growing silence, it just made sense for the castle to start putting together a few of its own conclusions about how the world really worked.

The castle had also found Harry Potter's recent theory on wand use and brain focus to be highly intriguing as well, as much as Severus had, if not more.

Finally it looked at Dumbledore in annoyance once more.

"DUMBLEDORE!" It yelled, rattling the silverware a bit.

Nothing.

 _Drat, he must be drunk again_.

If a castle could smirk, then a castle could shrug. A child had pointed that out to it once and it had liked the idea.

Surreptitiously, the castle turned on the water in all of the sinks present in Dumbledore's quarters, before stopping them up carefully. From there, it tightened the doorways around the entrances to his quarters ever so slightly, and set a charm on them to revert back to normal should anyone try to open the doors themselves.

Feeling creatively snarky, the castle created some pretty multicolored bubbles shaped like butterflies that would grow exponentially in number the higher the water got. It only created about 429 for the first go around.

Then it transfigured some of Dumbledore's empty bourbon bottles into quiet little meeping plastic ducks with a penchant for reproducing and creating waste (in the form of little glass marbles) at a far accelerated rate.

Finally, it set an invisible boundary around the edges of Dumbledore's room to prevent the water from leaving, although it decided NOT to extend that requirement to its later creations.

 _Aww,_ it thought sarcastically, as it surveyed the setting it had created.

…

Neville was perturbed, but also strangely amused, by the massive herd of small enchanted plastic ducks that he passed on his way to breakfast early Sunday morning. In their wake, he found a huge rolling pile of glass marbles that extended much farther down the hallway than he was willing to find out. Besides, he had a feeling that someone had just been pranked, and they were unlikely to be happy about it, especially at such an early hour.


	29. Firsts

For the first time in a week, Severus and Harry discovered that they could walk into another room without having to have the other with them. In some ways, this was a wonderful revelation to be had, since going to the bathroom in pairs had started becoming a little tedious. In fact, they had largely switched to using _evanesco_ to take care of the more difficult trips, as well as some of the smaller ones. In turn, _that_ had become tedious as well.

On the other hand, their relatively new freedom meant that Severus now spent an inordinate amount of time wondering about whether or not the lad was safe by himself, even though he was just next door. He knew his fear was largely illogical, but that knowledge had not helped alleviate his anxiety.

Luckily, it did allow Severus the opportunity to speak with Poppy at length, just the two of them, without fear of saying something that might upset the child.

In some ways, Poppy was largely their go-between for both the outer world and their own private one. With Christmas happening in less than a week, the fact that they were suddenly able to converse somewhat privately with another person meant that secrets could begin to be kept.

Severus began to see Harry watching him with more than his usual level of speculation, and he privately wondered if the looks had something to do with the upcoming holiday. He had tried to keep casual about the mention of the holiday itself. Of course he had mentioned the feast that would be that Friday at noon, and had asked in passing, whether the lad would be interested in going to it.

"Of course, Poppy will be there too," Severus had said thoughtfully, though without appearing to dwell too heavily on the idea.

"Can I sit between you two, like always?" The boy had asked, barely able to stand still with the idea, the excitement nearly pouring out his ears.

"I suppose we could make that happen," he had said slowly, appearing to think about it carefully, but really just furtively watching the boy as he whirled away to his room, his feet barely touching the ground.

It also had become apparent that the child had begun getting used to the idea of having a room, if only for the time being.

On the evening of the 21st, after finishing dinner with Poppy, Harry had shyly declared a desire to try sleeping in his own bed, but only if it was okay with Severus. Harry's exuberance towards the idea was nearly matched in strength, if not in display, by Severus himself. He dearly cared for the lad, but after years of solitude, he had found the enforced company of the boy to be more than a little tiring, and lately had found himself wishing for a bit of his privacy again. If the child did well with the move, then Severus would have his nighttime back again; which he knew was no small blessing.

Not much longer after that, the boy had begun yawning, and before long Severus had ordered him to go to bed. After the boy had done his nighttime business, Severus had gone to get him settled in.

"May I come in?" Severus asked from the doorway.

"Of course," Harry looked confused at his asking.

"You look perplexed. What's wrong?" Severus asked; having a feeling he already knew the answer.

"You didn't have to ask to come in. These are your quarters, after all." The boy said, looking up at Severus, the puzzlement still visible on his face.

"Ah. However, as I told you earlier, for now this is your room." He answered lightly.

The boy grinned his shy grin at Severus, as was becoming his custom for whenever the man made any gestures of perceived kindness towards him. Severus felt that he wasn't doing much more that providing the boy with a few amenities that his bastard relatives should have done long ago for the boy, but he wasn't about to argue the point. There were some things better left unsaid.

"Severus, look what the castle did while you were still out there with Poppy," the boy said, gesturing him closer to the bed.

Crouching, he looked at the bed itself, but did not see any differences. The walls were the same cold gray that they had been before, only—he looked closer at them as Harry let out a giggle.

"All right brat, what is it?" He asked with a smirk.

"Try pressing on the wall," the boy said, by way of hinting.

Severus did, and to his great surprise, he discovered that the wall had some give, making it feel somewhat like a soft cushion.

" _This way, if he flails in his sleep, you won't have to worry about him getting hurt from contact with his surroundings_ ," the castle voice said without warning in his head.

"Impressive," he said, honestly amazed with the castle's ingenuity, as well as its concern for the both of them.

" _Thanks_ ," the castle said, sounding almost shy about it.

Severus briefly found himself wondering how often the castle was complimented.

"It's brilliant." The boy said, while his eyes shone with wonder. He took his glasses off and laid them on his trunk carefully, before sliding farther under the covers.

Severus pulled them up around his still small body, suddenly fearing whether the boy would be warm enough that night.

" _I won't let him get cold,"_ the castle promised softly.

Severus thanked him in his head, as he leaned over to kiss the boy goodnight.

"If you need anything, just ask. Understand?" He said for emphasis.

"Yes sir," the child said sleepily.

Severus spelled off the light, before leaving the room. He closed the door on his way out, but did not shut it completely, just in case something should happen.

Turning around, he found Poppy waiting for him with a small smile on her face, and he scowled at her, knowing too well what she was about to say to him.

…

When Poppy saw him finally exit the boy's room, she couldn't help but smile at him. She saw him scowl darkly at her expression, but she had been expecting that and only smiled more broadly in return.

"I can't help but find myself continuing to be amazed by your increasing depths of emotion concerning the child." She said with an open handed shrug.

"Need you constantly bring this up?" He groused, but she thought it highly likely that he was more embarrassed than annoyed at her statement.

Not wanting to invoke a fight, no matter how amusing she might find it, she let the topic drop, at least in part.

"My brother sends his regards and says he hopes you have a happy Christmas," she said to him with a grin.

The statement was purposely obscure, given that Harry was in the next room over.

"Oh?" Was all Severus said in response, although she also saw a small smile touch the corners of his lips briefly.

"Are you going to take him shopping?" She asked curiously.

"Should I?" He asked her with a purposeful look on his face.

"Well, I would offer, but given that he can't yet leave your side, it doesn't actually seem to be a viable option." She said, giving him a look of his own.

"I haven't decided," he said more seriously.

"You could go in disguise," she said, guessing one possible concern.

"The thought has crossed my mind, more than a few times now, actually. I believe that you two are up to something as well though, are you not?"

"Honestly Severus," she said, saying nothing with a glare.

"Oh good, we will have to come up with a response then. I believe that has settled it. We shall go tomorrow, unless something unforeseen should arise," he said, raising an eyebrow at her sudden blustering.

Crossing her arms, she inquired as to where they would go.

"And let you in on our response?" He asked in mock surprise. "I should think not." He sneered.

Yes, she did like this new Severus Snape very much indeed.

…

He couldn't sit still. He couldn't stand still either, for that matter.

Severus was taking him shopping today.

And it was only 3 days until Christmas!

He didn't know why the idea of Christmas made him so bizarrely crazy. The Christmas's that he had spent with the Dursleys had always been miserable affairs for him.

In contrast, the Christmas experience at Hogwarts, the year before, had given him a taste of what the holiday was supposed to be like, and he had a feeling—more than a feeling really—that this year's Christmas would far surpass that one.

He had been afraid, well terrified rather, that when Severus saw all that had happened to him by way of his memories, the man would have been disgusted to be around him, but nothing of the sort had occurred. If anything, the man had begun talking to him more frequently, about a variety of topics not just limited to his dour past.

The man was willing to listen to his fears and questions and concerns just like he had seen with other kids around—well, around their family members. He wasn't quite willing to let himself think of Severus as a parental figure, no matter how much he might secretly want it to be so. This way, if he was just leading himself on for nothing, it wouldn't hurt so much when it didn't happen.

But he hoped it did. He really really hoped it did. He had even talked to the castle about it, after Severus had turned out the light and left.

" _Are you his pebble?"_ The castle had asked him from within his head.

The question had been so ludicrous and yet so serious at the same time that Harry had had no idea whether to laugh or cry. He had settled for coughing lightly, and then had been stuck with a great deal of fluttering emotions leftover in his stomach.

"You mean, am I his child?" He had asked, needing it clarified before he dared to think on the idea further.

" _I suppose, but I like my term better,"_ the castle had said reluctantly.

"Not yet," he had admitted quietly. "Maybe never," he then added, somewhat miserably.

" _I think you underestimate him. I think he would make a fine rock father._ "

"Rock father?"

" _My walls are a mixture of stone and earth. The rock quarry that I was built out of is one half of my creation, while the dirt, or the earth itself, is the other half."_ The castle explained.

"Oh, wow. So the earth is your mum?"

" _Yes,"_ the castle had said.

"I wish my mum were still alive," the boy had whispered, suddenly tearful.

" _Severus and Lily were very good friends in school,_ " the castle had said, purposely not going into details.

"Yeah?" The boy had asked. "I wish I could have known her."

" _Severus wishes the same_ ," the castle had said.

For some reason, this had made Harry so terribly mournful that both he and Severus had wished for something that would never happen. It was yet another reason why he wouldn't allow himself to dream for something more permanent with his mentor _._

"What is your name?" Harry had asked, wishing to change the subject.

" _Hogwarts, I suppose."_ The castle had answered, sounding less than enthused.

"What name does your mum call you by?" He had asked, thinking that maybe the castle had a better name that no one knew.

" _It's actually rather similar to what Severus often calls you_. _The translation doesn't exactly work, given that the ancient language that my 'mum' speaks is so different from the language of people. So for clarity's sake, let's just say she calls me 'lad,'_ " the castle had said carefully.

Harry had giggled at the castle's comparison.

"If you could pick your own name then, what would you choose?" He had asked in a moment of insight.

" _Hmm, now that's a question I've never been asked._ " The castle had said, sounding rather excited at the prospect. " _Well, when your mum was in school here, I made friends with her, like with you. She told me about a fictional story called '_ Star Trek,' _in which a man named James T. Kirk explores the galaxy with his friends on a ship called the '_ Enterprise.'" The castle had said, happy to be finally sharing something with someone else.

"I know about that too," Harry had said, more than a little amused to be discussing a science fiction muggle show with an ancient magical castle. "Would you like me to call you 'Enterprise'?" He had asked.

" _Oh yuck, no way,"_ the castle had denied ferociously.

"What do you have in mind then?"

" _I always liked the description of Captain Kirk. His first name is the same as your middle one,"_ the castle had said, suddenly sounding rather shy.

"Oh yeah," Harry had said.

" _But in the show, Lily said that everyone who was friends with him just called him '_ Jim.'" The castle explained. " _I thought, if it wouldn't be too much trouble to you, maybe you could call me_ 'Jimmy'? _After all, you are my friend,_ " The castle had asked nervously.

Harry was more than a little impressed that the castle thought of him as a friend.

"Jimmy. I like it. Will you tell Severus?" He had asked.

" _Should I?"_ Jimmy had asked him hesitantly.

"Yes," Harry had said firmly; wanting yet another thing he could share with the older man.

Harry had gone to sleep then, only to wake up the next morning and discover that Severus had decided to take him shopping. He had told him during breakfast and now Harry was anxiously pacing the sitting area while Severus finished getting things ready for their trip.

"Harry?" Severus said, finally stepping into the room.

"Sir?" Harry said automatically.

"I thought I told you to get ready to go outside." Severus said, frowning at him.

"But Severus, I am." He said, trying to make it seem as though he didn't know what Severus was talking about.

"Then where is your cloak, impertinent brat?" Severus demanded sternly.

"Doesn't fit?" He offered up, feeling idiotic under the man's unwavering stare.

"Child," the man's gaze softened significantly, "why did you not tell me?"

He scratched his neck, turning away so that Severus wouldn't see his embarrassment. He hadn't wanted to tell Severus the reason that the cloak didn't fit; it was too awful.

"Harry," Severus said in a warning voice.

Harry miserably sat down on the couch. Severus walked over and sat down next to him, silently offering Harry his support as he correctly identified another problem connected with the Dursleys. He took Harry's hand and pulled the boy so that they were looking at one another.

"Lad, tell me. There is no way that I will be angry at you, although I cannot swear the same for those idiotic filth relatives of yours," the man said gently.

"I didn't buy a new one because at the beginning of the school year, the old one still fit. In fact," Harry said as he felt his face turn red, "it was a bit loose."

Severus put an arm around his shoulders then and silently embraced him, while Harry relaxed in the warmth.

"I daresay that you should now understand the mechanics of the shrinking spell well enough to perform it yourself, yes?" The man asked him after releasing him so that they could see each other's faces once more.

Harry had to grin a bit at that.

"I think so. I've only watched you do it nearly every day for a week now sir," he answered cheekily.

"Brat."

Harry grinned wider at the man's playful tone.

As it turned out, Harry had no trouble shrinking one of Severus's older cloaks down to an appropriate size. Cloaks, after all, were meant to fit a bit loosely, in order to accommodate for extra layers underneath. It was a very good item for a beginner to practice on.

"Are you sure you didn't plan this?" He asked Severus then, as they were preparing to floo out.

"The cloak?"

"Yes."

"I suppose that it had crossed my mind at some point, especially after seeing the state of the clothes your pissant excuse for relatives had given you." Severus said seriously.

"Severus?" He asked then, a question bobbing at the front of his mind.

"Yes lad?" Severus asked, inadvertently reminding Harry of Jimmy.

"Are you purposely referring to my 'pissant relatives,' as you said, with a new insult each time?" He asked, beginning to grin.

"Now Harry, why on earth would I choose to call your poor excuse for dog vomit relatives anything other than what they were?" Severus asked him, managing to keep a straight face throughout his answer.

Harry, however, felt that his strength of will was not nearly comparable as he soon found himself giggling out loud at Severus's continuing unwavering look. He didn't even notice when Severus applied glamours upon them both as they prepared to go through the floo.

He was still giggling a little as they arrived into the Leaky Cauldron. But he soon became serious as Severus quietly took him by the arm and led him quickly outside and then into Diagon Alley.

"Won't someone recognize us and wonder why we're out together?" He asked nervously.

"No, silly boy," Severus said with a smirk. "I cast what's called a 'Glamour' charm upon us both before we flooed. It changes our outer visual appearance to something else, even under direct scrutiny from another."

"Cool!" He answered, greatly relieved not to have to endure that day's outing as the damnable "boy-who-lived." "I hate being gawked at," he said sourly.

"In direct contrast, I tend to be hissed at when I walk through public wizarding spaces," Severus said with a scowl.

"Ugh," Harry said, taking the man's hand and squeezing it gently.

He watched Severus's face soften in response before feeling him squeeze back.

"What should we do about names and whatnot?" Harry asked, suddenly realizing that the charm was only a visual one.

"I think that if you stick to 'sir,' and I keep to 'lad,' then that should be fine for where we are headed. If you remember, I still have the charmed necklace that Poppy made. If you are in any kind of distress, and I happen to be out of sight, then it will alert me instantly." Severus said as they carefully made their way through streets filled with throngs of people.

Around them blew a stiff icy breeze which took Harry's breath away, but which also invigorated him as well, after spending more than a week in the dungeons.

"Where are we going sir?" He asked after a moment as they passed most of the stores that he knew and continued onwards.

"What did I say about those glasses?" Severus prompted.

"Oh! Thank you sir!" He said skipping for a bit. He thought that Severus might mind the childish behavior, but the older man only smirked at him, keeping his thoughts to himself for once.

Then suddenly, Severus announced they had arrived.

Harry looked at what appeared to be an old dilapidated house sitting among throngs of lesser visited businesses. Although he knew better than to judge wizarding buildings by their appearances, he still walked closer by Severus's side as they made their way inside.

As he had suspected, the inside was absolutely nothing like the outside of the building. The waiting room was clean and brightly lit, with modern furnishings in muted tones. Severus took him straight to the front desk and quietly made mention of an appointment with some Dr. Lentz to the receptionist.

"You'd be Mr. Snape then, I suppose?" The woman asked, eyeing Severus carefully as he nodded in response. "Very well; if you will take a seat, he'll be with you in a moment."

As soon as they had sat down, Harry leaned closer to Severus with a questioning looking in his face.

"You could have given any name. I thought you didn't want to be recognized?" He asked, suddenly very confused.

"Calm yourself lad. I have not rashly given myself away. Dr. Lentz is an old acquaintance of my family's, although I wouldn't automatically call him a friend. He is the very best at what he does and he owes me a favor. He will not speak of this to anyone, I promise." Severus said quickly, purposely speaking only loud enough for Harry to hear.

Harry nodded and Severus was the one to squeeze his hand that time.

"You remember my first promise to you child?" Severus asked him then.

"Of course I do sir," Harry said nodding briskly, surprised at Severus's mention of that. How could he forget the man's promise to not allow anyone ever to hurt him again? For days it had been all he could think of.

Then Severus's name was called and in what felt like no time at all, Harry quickly found himself sitting in front of Dr. Lentz, in what looked like a perfectly typical eye exam room. Dr. Lentz didn't appear to be much older than Poppy, but as he had been recently reminded, wizarding appearances were never quite as they seemed. For all Harry knew, the man in front of him could be 140 years old. He was a slightly rotund man, somewhat like Father Christmas, but without the outward appearance of joyful merriness. His hair was a bit wild, somewhat like his own, but it was sprinkled with silver all throughout, making the man appear somewhat austere in his features.

Harry was almost inclined to be frightened of him, even with Severus in the room, if it were not for the very odd object strapped to his head, currently resting on his brow. It was beset with a number of golden bronze knobs along its sides. In its center sat two glass lenses, apparently for the purpose of allowing Dr. Lentz to better see Harry's eyes with. In a way, it looked a bit like the man had a small set of binoculars strapped to his face, but none like Harry had ever seen before.

"Mr. Snape," Dr. Lentz said formally, "if you would like to, I invite you to take a seat next to your boy."

Harry was afraid that Severus would remain fixed at the door, so he shot him a pleading look, which Severus looked blankly back at. Regardless, Severus did move to take the proffered seat next to Harry, before offering the boy his hand.

Harry took it, grateful for the contact with the man. Dr. Lentz's unwavering stare was beginning to unnerve him somewhat.

"All right lad," Dr. Lentz said, using the same phrase as Severus did. He pulled the contraption down on upon his eyes and gazed at Harry, his eyes now magnified as they peered at him closely.

And then, it could have only been a second, Dr. Lentz jumped a bit, before regaining his composure quickly.

"Severus! You old rat. You could have told me who you were before now, you know." The man said, sounding a bit put out at the other man's deception.

"I didn't know if you would recognize me. I had to make sure." Severus answered with a sneer.

"How could I not, you old fleabag!" The man said, nearly shouting, only to be interrupted by an unexpected sound.

Harry couldn't help but laughing at the two men, especially after Dr. Lentz had begun his tirade of putdowns. It was too similar to Severus's own descriptions of the Dursleys.

Dr. Lentz looked back at him, his mouth setting up in a grin as well.

"This boy has been spending too much time around you Severus," he said speculatively.

Severus scowled deeply at him, but shot Harry a wink too.

"I take it you recognize him as well then, you paltry excuse for an old gentleman?" Severus asked him.

"Right," the old man said sarcastically with a sneer of his own. "I recognize the boy I haven't seen in twenty damn years, but fail to notice that Harry-bloody-Potter is sitting right here in my own office? No offense lad," he said to Harry after finishing his outburst.

"None taken," Harry said with a grin.

"At least you're not entirely senile then," Severus said to him, leaning back with a satisfied smirk on his face.

Harry snorted and they both looked at him.

"Perhaps the boy has a point there Severus. Maybe if we allowed him to see us, he'd realize just how stupid the two of us look, flipping insults back and forth like we're a bleeding tennis match." The older man said seriously as he abruptly turned businesslike.

"Let me have those poor pitiful excuses for a pair of glasses you have there on your face, lad," Dr. Lentz said, reaching out a hand for them.

Harry pulled them off carefully, not sad to see them go, but mostly because with them off, he no longer could see much of anything.

"You should get Severus to give a proper memorial service for these poor dead things," the large blob on his right said.

He was rewarded by a snort from the grayish-black blob to Harry's left.

Harry was then instructed to sit up and look into what Dr. Lentz referred to as the "oculizers."

"Dr. Lentz sir?" He asked.

"Lad, what is it?"

"I don't know where they are. You're just a rather large blob to me, no offense," he said grinning shyly.

"That's the way lad! Hit us where it hurts," Dr. Lentz's voice said jovially. "All right Harry, I'm going to reach out and move your head in the direction it needs to be, got it?"

"Yes sir," Harry said, grateful for the warning.

Once Harry's head was moved into position, Dr. Lentz mostly just seemed to look at him. Every so often he tutted and turned a knob or two on the side of his 'oculizers.' For every touch of a knob, Harry heard a corresponding pitched clicking sound, but otherwise nothing much else happened, at least from Harry's extremely limited point of view.

Then, at last, when he was allowed to move his head, it was only to look through the same sorts of lenses that any muggle eye doctor had in his office.

"I suppose you don't need to look at the pictures of dragons, do you now lad? Letters it be for you," Dr. Lentz muttered oddly to himself, carefully adjusting the settings with his wand.

Whatever Dr. Lentz had done while staring at him with his oculizers had apparently done the trick; Harry found himself looking through lenses that seemed to completely fix his vision instantaneously. Not only could he read the first three rows of letters without difficulty, but he could also read the bottom line with perfect clarity as well.

As it turned out, the bottom line was actually a set of instructions informing him to stick out his tongue and blink three times if he could read it. He did as it had said and was amazed to see the moving picture of an aggressive dragon appear in the space where the letters had been. He laughed in delight at the dragon, but also from pure joy at being able to see so well.

When he finally turned away from the dragon, he did so with a bright smile.

"I believe we got the right balance for you then lad, I'd say," Dr. Lentz said, his face fuzzy once more before Harry's own eyes.

"Now I'm going to set a charm on your eyes that will hold the level of vision you just experienced for the next half hour, while you go and pick out some lenses. I do believe that you shall be wanting some different ones while I feed these old ones to the goats, yes? Very good." Dr. Lentz sounded pleased as he tapped Harry's head twice with wand, muttering something as he did. Harry blinked and there it was again, the whole world at his fingertips.

He turned towards Severus and was surprised to see a real smile touching his lips at the boy's obvious joy. Harry felt that he oughtn't, but couldn't resist jumping up and hugging the man, at least briefly. After he quickly stepped back, he saw a faint tinge of pink across the tips of Severus's ears and had to fight with himself not to smile at the discomfited man.

"Brat." The man said, standing up quickly to hide his brief vulnerability.

They were nearly out the door when Dr. Lentz mentioned something to Severus about his mother.

"She was a beautiful woman Severus. Eileen would have been proud to see you like this." The man said, completely serious now.

Harry looked up at Severus to see what his reaction would be. The man's eyes—which Harry could now easily see the pupils within—had initially narrowed defensively at the man's words, but as Harry watched, the man's face relaxed.

"Thank you Thallius," Severus said, opening the door with a hand on Harry's shoulder, guiding him into hallway carefully.

"Bye," Harry waved at Dr. Lentz as he went.

"You keep an eye on him boy. He's an ornery one." Dr. Lentz said with a clearly viewable smile. Harry nodded at his words, still smiling.

Severus guided him down the hallway and into a relatively large room on the far right. He had taken Harry's hand again sometime during their walk, but Harry had neither noticed when, nor cared about the action. He liked having his hand held. It was as though Severus didn't want to lose him, which had always been the exact opposite of the message he had gotten from the Dursleys whenever he had been allowed in public with them.

Harry gasped as he saw the room that they had walked into. It was full of a multitude of various styles and colors of frames that ranged from the mundane to the outrageous. Some of the glasses hooted and made sounds—rude sounds in some cases—while others advertised themselves as the end-all, be-all products of completely accessorized beauty care gadgetry. Of those, Harry saw some that not only worked as glasses, but also provided sunglasses, tiny wipers (for those unpleasant rainy days), eyebrow waxing kits (automatic, works like a charm!), toenail clippers (promotes flexibility!), and even fully extendable rain gear (with optional traffic whistle).

Severus steered him clear of those, even though Harry could have stood there for hours just gawking endlessly, and onto the section of "Slightly mundane, but Always Practical," styled frames.

"Wow, Severus, it says that all of the glasses in this section are not only smudge proof, but also completely shatter and water resistant!" He bounced haphazardly. Severus gave him a look and Harry made himself calm down, at least visibly, but his excitement only increased the more they looked.

Suddenly a pair of frames caught his eyes and he knew without a doubt that he had found the right ones for him. On the tag, it read:

**Cleo's Cool and Classy Eyewear**

**These glasses are guaranteed to be:** smudge proof, shatter proof, and water resistant.

 **Special features include:** Lightweight Frame, Never Dropped Binding, 3 Years of Instant Eyewear Adjustments, Unsinkable, and Chameleon Color Charm (matches your outfit's color scheme automatically!)

**Repair Kit and Tracking Charm Included, With Portkey Optional**

They shimmered at him alluringly, but he suspected that they would stop once they had a definite color to match. The frames were sleek and thin, but surprisingly sturdy to the touch. When he put them on, the Chameleon Color Charm kicked in, matching his gray top with an amazingly adept level of accuracy. The colors in his glasses connected well with his outfit, but were subtle enough to promote the brightness of his eyes.

Harry loved them.

"Are those it then, child?" Severus asked from where he had been quietly watching the boy stare in rapture at the glasses on his face in one of the many available mirrors.

Harry turned to look at Severus, able to now see the care in the man's face as well as hear it in his voice.

"Do they look okay to you?" He asked anxiously, hoping that he wasn't the only one enamored by the new frames sitting lightly atop his nose.

"Child, you have always been Lily's son, but with those glasses on, the link between the two of you is now almost completely undeniable. Your face is very striking now. They are a good fit for you, I believe." Severus said thoughtfully.

Harry's hesitant look cracked open into a brilliant glowing smile at the older man's praising words and additional mention of his mother. He wondered if Dr. Lentz's mention of Severus's own mother had been related to the man's outpouring of kind words.

"Thanks Severus," he said as he abruptly found himself wrapped tightly around Severus's lean torso once more.

…

Severus had taken the boy in his glasses up to the woman at the booth in the middle of the room to apply and finalize the charm on the glasses, and then paid and retrieved the free repair kit and tracking charm. As he explained to Harry, the tracking charm worked double duty when the boy was wearing the glasses, because not only would they be able to track the glasses, but also Harry himself, as a resultant bonus.

Then they were done and on their way to start the boy onto building a real wardrobe. As far as he could tell, the child's school clothes were perfectly adequate, but that was largely it for the boy. He needed a complete overhaul from his underclothes and up.

He had been a bit overcome by the change that a simple new pair of glasses had caused in Harry's overall appearance. The boy's face all but screamed out Lily's name to him, making him simultaneously miss her, yet in turn, love him all that much more.

In addition, he had been thankful for the time that Harry had been absorbed in looking at the various frame options. Thallius's passing remarks to him had caught him completely off guard, and he had needed that brief time to recuperate and gather his wits back around him. His mother had died when he was still a boy, even younger than Harry was now.

He had not been prepared for the reawakening of pain that he had experienced at just the mere mention of his mother's name. It was not just pain from having lost her so early, but also some of what he suspected Harry to suffer from at times; the pain of what _might have been_.

Thallius Lentz was not typically a sentimental man, nor had he ever been. He had actually been a bit worried about taking the child to him, given Thallius's trademark dislike for youngsters. It had therefore been surprising to see the man take such an instant liking to the boy. Thallius had also liked the young Severus Snape in a similar way, but probably for different reasons. He had never cared to ask, not being entirely sure if he actually wanted to know the answer to the man's unusual reaction.

Severus looked up to realize that he had walked the boy all the way back to the regular Diagon Alley proper, without even being entirely aware of most of the trip. Internally he chastised himself for his negligence; he knew now that he would not easily continue on if the child were to be harmed or grievously injured while in his presence. He had made a wizard's oath to protect the boy, and he meant to do it. He promised himself some real thinking time when they got back to his quarters. In the meantime however, they needed to find a store that catered to a boy like Harry.

They passed by Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasions shop, before Severus finally found something that would fit most of, if not all, Harry's current clothes needs.

"Come on lad," he said, steering the boy through the cold busy streets carefully. They reached the shop and stepped into the warm inner embrace of the store itself. The advertisement on the outside stated that it stocked a range of sizes and styles for all children and youth. In addition, he saw with a small modicum of trepidation, a number of his students and presumably their parents, looking excitedly through the selections there as well.

He steeled himself to put up with the frequently falsely polite atmospheres common to establishments like this. He knew that once they had some basics in place, as well as an inkling of the child's size needs, he was then going to focus the rest of the boy's wardrobe expansion via owl post.

"I don't want you to let go of my hand unless you should need to try something on, understand me?" He asked the boy sternly as they walked through the store.

"Yes sir," the boy gulped as he instinctively walked closer to Severus.

Severus could see that he was not the only one discomfited by such an environment as this. He knew he shouldn't feel relieved at Harry's similar feelings, but he could not help but feel comforted that his was not the only irrational opinion.

As they got farther into the back of the store, he began seeking out someone who looked possibly competent enough to help with their complex needs. Knowing what he did about the boy's past, he was quite unwilling to place the child with anyone who might dare betray that sacred trust again.

Abruptly, he heard a voice speak to him from his far left. He turned towards it, instinctively blocking the boy's body behind his own, only to discover the speaker to be a beautiful dark skinned woman. Surprisingly, he actually recognized the girl as having been one of his favorite students from nearly five years prior. Moreover, he realized that it might actually be advantageous to reveal his identity to her, considering that she had been a Slytherin Head Girl in her time.

He stepped to the side to bring Harry back out into the open to meet the girl—well, now the woman—who was standing before them, offering her help in finding clothes.

"As I recall, your name was Marjorie Zeggley, am I correct?" He asked seriously.

"Do I know you sir? Mr.—?" she broke off in confusion.

"Snape," he said softly, leaning his head in close to her ear, before reveling in her utter shock.

"Professor!" She growled accusingly, as she glared incredulously at him.

"I'd appreciate it if you didn't spread it around too much, Ms. Zeggley," he said bitingly, but with an amused expression in his eyes.

"Sorry!" She said, raising her hands in apology. "Oh, and Professor?"

"Yes?"

"It's Marjorie Hornblower now," she said, showing him the ring on her finger.

"He was a Ravenclaw, was he not?" He asked, remembering something about a short red haired boy who had played Catcher in those years for the Ravenclaw Quidditch team.

"Gah. I always hated your memory," she said pursing her lips at him in frustration.

He felt a squeeze on his hand and looked down at his charge, who looked silently up at him with a questioning face.

"Marjorie," he said, thinking quickly, "this is my nephew, Evan," he said, using a similar version of Lily's maiden name for the boy's first name. Harry though, seemed to understand, catching onto the plot quickly.

"Pleased to meet you," the boy said solemnly, sticking out his hand politely.

"I'm very pleased to meet you as well," Marjorie said with a kind smile, leaning to shake his hand for a moment before standing back up.

"What can I do to help you two gentlemen today?" She asked, slipping into a more professional mode.

"Evan has recently had a rather significant growth spurt, and more or less needs a completely new wardrobe," he said, remembering back to the cloak issue from earlier that day.

"Well, he's not the only one with that problem," she said, smiling at them both. "If you will follow me then, I think I know how to help."

They followed her through the store carefully. Severus shot a careful look at Harry, only to be rewarded by a raised eyebrow that he had likely learned from spending so much time around him. Thallius had been right about that.

"Growth spurt?" Harry mouthed up at him, clearly amused by his quick answers.

"Brat," he shot back down at him.

Harry snorted lightly at him in return. Luckily for them, the sound was nearly completely covered up by the background noise of busy holiday shoppers.

"This section of the store is stocked entirely by the Wizarding company called Geyser Gear," Marjorie told them once they'd reached her intended destination. "It's marketed to ki—ah, young people who are currently undergoing incredible changes in height and weight, thanks to the joy that is puberty." She finished; a sarcastic undertone evident when she mentioned puberty.

Severus had to bite down on a groan as he figured out the connection between the name and the specific clothing that they made.

"Geyser Gear, growth spurts," Harry quipped just then, making a face. "Ew."

"Indeed," Severus said in complete agreement.

"I'm not sure if they actually meant it to come across that way," Marjorie said, trying to retain a serious demeanor.

"Ew either way," Harry said, his face still crumpled up.

Severus was forced to shoot Marjorie a glare when she let out a small giggle at his unpleasant expression.

"Sorry professor," she said, clearing her throat. "Regardless of the connotations of its name, the clothing is amazingly useful, because it grows with you through at least two major size changes."

Severus raised his eyebrows, mildly impressed.

"That's pretty cool," Harry admitted grudgingly.

"Right, so let's find out what size you wear," she said, smiling brightly at him.

…

It had taken two hours out of his life, but Severus and Harry were finally done with his so-called basic shopping. Harry had fallen asleep on a stool before they had finished wrapping and shrinking all of the parcels that Severus had bought for the boy.

Now the boy was being carried tightly against Severus's side, while the bag of purchases was held with his free hand. One thing was sure about Severus's relationship with Harry—he was most certainly going to gain some more muscle mass in the process.

He had set a silencing spell around them to keep the noise from the marketplace from interfering with the boy's sleep. It had occurred to him that the last silencing spell that had been used around Harry had not worked, but he believed it likely had more to do with Harry having been disconnected from Severus, rather than the idea that Harry some kind of new hidden power that had never shown itself before or since.

Although Severus was only a short walk away from the Leaky Cauldron, he decided to stop off in one more store on his way back to Hogwarts. The Quidditch supply store was glowing brightly against the dim winter day, and with Harry fast asleep in his arms, it seemed an opportune time for him to quickly peruse its shelves.

Amazingly, he was in and out in just fifteen minutes. Apparently he had caught the store at a lull, or so a haggard looking employee had said to him when he gone up to pay. Even though the object that he had bought was already fairly small, he had quietly asked for it to be shrunk anyways. The employee had only needed to take one look at the boy who was fast asleep in his arms to understand why.

"Shopping with a kid at Christmas is insane mate," the man had said to Severus sympathetically as he shrunk the present down into the size of a gumball. Severus had put it in his inside pocket with a small grin and then nodded at the clerk, before picking up his other bag and setting off swiftly for the floo at the Leaky Cauldron.

Thankfully, with Harry's new glasses, he no longer had to worry about the possibility that they might fall off while the boy was asleep. As it was, he was more than a little exhausted as well, and thought it likely that the child would not be the only one asleep after they arrived at home.

 _Home_ —that word had kept appearing in Severus's mind; his own childhood home, like Harry's, had been less than a satisfactory experience for him, and likely his mother as well, if his gut feeling had any say in it. His father wasn't the same breed of sniveling perverted bastards that the Dursleys were, but he was bad enough in his own way.

As Severus stepped from the floo into his now brightly lit quarters, he couldn't help but smile in response to Poppy and Minerva's efforts to make the room more festive. He had not been exactly thrilled with the idea of letting Minerva into his quarters while not in them himself, but Poppy had talked him into it.

Apparently Minerva had finally made a decision about Dumbledore's increasingly idiotic actions, and according to Poppy, that decision had been _against_ the old man. Besides, Poppy had promised to keep an _extremely close eye_ on the Gryffindor head of house as long as they were in there.

Severus set down the clothing in Harry's room, before carefully pulling back the covers and putting the boy down. He quickly removed the boy's cloak and boots from his person, before tucking him in lightly. He removed the glamour from both of them as well, in case he should forget later. Then he removed the child's glasses and carefully laid them down on the child's trunk.

As was his own private custom, he kissed the boy lightly on his head before exiting the room, leaving the door fully open as he exited.

In the other room, he quickly reversed the effects of the shrinking spell on his small wrapped parcel, and then placed it under the already decorated tree. As he had gathered, the boy had only one good Christmas memory, and he had every intention on adding on to it with the celebration this Christmas. As he was about to stand up, his eyes caught the sight of another present already under the tree. He lifted it up and looked at the inscription. With little surprise, he realized it was addressed to both Harry and himself. He nodded to himself as he put it down, and then went to find his own nap.


	30. The Long Awaited Eve (ALSO the beginning what I like to call THE INTERLUDE OF INSANITY)

Harry had been far past overjoyed to awake and find not only a new set of dresser drawers in his room, but then to walk into the main room and find a brightly lit Christmas tree just sitting there waiting for him? Oh it was too much. Apparently he had been hopping again without realizing it, because a moment later, Severus had padded out of his room, sans cloak and shoes, just like Harry. And although he had declined to bounce around like an "overly hyper chipmunk," as he had put it, Harry had still been able to see the excitement in his stance.

In fact, he could see many things that he hadn't been aware of earlier. He'd practically dragged Severus back through all the rooms he had ever been in, just to see what things _really_ looked like, as compared with the fuzzy images that he had in his memories. Amazingly enough, Severus had actually indulged the "journey;" well, for a bit anyways.

That had been two days earlier, and he still couldn't help but randomly wander through the rooms, looking at the walls, just to ensure that he wasn't actually just dreaming. Everything looked great to his now clear eyes, even the plain stone walls of the dungeons themselves.

After explaining about before and after differences to Severus, the man had made the wise decision that a walk through the castle was in order; hopefully _before_ he fell through the floor due to the child's incessant bouncing.

Harry had giggled at Severus's mock annoyance with him, thinking he liked how all of Severus's facial expressions looked too, even the snarky ones. On the way out the door, he had mentioned that to the older man and Severus had responded by suggesting they go and visit Poppy to have Harry's head looked at.

"It is _not_ rotten Severus!" Harry said, sticking his tongue out quickly, before following Severus into the hall. He was wearing some of his new clothes and he was more than a little anxious to know what Poppy thought of his appearance now, especially with his new glasses. Severus, of course, had his regular robes on, but he hadn't made Harry wear his, which had been fine with him.

Over the past few days, to his great disappointment, Poppy had been working unusually hard in the infirmary and had not been able to come down to dinner, like she had been doing regularly before. Therefore, Severus's suggestion to go and visit _her,_ for once, as opposed to the other way around, was actually a very good idea. He just wasn't sure about how she would react when she saw him. That's all.

Since it was their first stroll through the hallways of Hogwarts in nearly two weeks, Severus had suggested that they take it slow, given both of their track records for finding trouble. He had also reminded Harry to call him Professor Snape when they were outside his quarters once more. Harry had nodded seriously, hoping that he didn't accidentally screw up. If nothing else, he could always revert to doing as he had in Diagon Alley and just call him "sir."

"Harry," Severus said after they had moved out of sight from his quarters.

"Sir?"

"I want to see if we're still bound as closely together," Severus said, obviously in the mood for an experiment.

Harry looked at him expectantly.

"You stay where you are, and I shall endeavor to learn the extent of our tether," Severus said.

"Okay Professor Snape," Harry answered with a cheeky smile.

Severus shot him a look that clearly said "Brat," before he had started walking.

He made managed about ten meters before stopping.

When Severus had initially begun walking, Harry had been able to just watch his retreating back with just mild interest. However, for the last five meters of that walk, Harry had begun feeling a strange little pulling sensation in the middle of his sternum, which only increased the farther that Severus got away from him. It was making Harry very much inclined to want to run after him, no matter what the man had said about staying where he was.

Once it was obvious that Severus could move no further, Harry had begun running towards him, no longer certain if he could stand the itching feeling in the middle of his chest. He didn't slow down until he was only an arm's length out from the man, causing him to nearly plow him over.

Now that he had his arms wrapped tightly around Severus's middle, he no longer felt the inexorable pull, but he still trembled for nearly a full minute before feeling more like himself again.

Severus had held him tightly the entire time, even though someone could have easily walked by at any point. It was for that reason that Harry finally made himself let go of him and step backwards. Severus, however, kept an arm on his shoulder even as he did so, making him glad that they hadn't entirely separated.

"Child, what did you feel?" The man asked him in concern.

"The f-farther you got out, the more I just felt this weird itchy, pulling feeling in my center. And I w-would have run after you sooner, but you said to stay put, so I did." He said, suddenly feeling very muddled.

"I could tell something was wrong, from my link to you, if not just from your facial expression, once I heard you coming." Severus said, pulling him in for a quick squeeze across his shoulders, before releasing him entirely.

"Do you want to keep walking or go back?" Severus asked gently.

"Keep going," Harry said, starting to regain some of his previous enthusiasm for the trip. "Just don't go wandering off, please," he said, hoping Severus didn't think he was trying to order the man around.

"As long as you keep to the same agreement," Severus said seriously, as they began walking down the hall once more.

…

Two stairwells and several twists and turns later, they were entering the infirmary once more; only for once, neither was seriously injured and both were upright.

Severus had taken things slowly at first, but the feeling that had occurred before had slowly faded the longer they stayed together side by side.

He looked at the boy, still pleased to see him in clothes that not only fit well, but looked good on him too. He was still enjoying the sight of the new glasses on his face, nearly as much as the child enjoyed being able to see out of them.

The lenses of his new glasses were squares with rounded corners. The rims were currently pea green, outlined in black, which matched his pea green button up shirt and black slacks and shoes. The frames of the glasses provided a striking look for the boy against his reflective green eyes. The boy had chosen well.

Now that the child was no longer swallowed in his pants and shirts, it was much easier to see the shape of the boy, even if that shape was still near painfully thin. He hoped to continue changing that. He knew that thanks to four months of being at Hogwarts and having regular access to food, Harry had finally outgrown the previous year's cloak. Hopefully he would continue to give Severus a reason to buy things for him.

Not seeing anyone immediately upon entering the main opening, they walked further towards the back wall. Hearing a sudden gasp, Severus felt certain that they had done something right with their entrance. For his part, he had freshly showered and washed his hair carefully, so that it was shining healthily in the light.

"Oh my," Poppy said, walking up to them carefully. "Don't you two look so nice," she said.

"Is Minerva here as well?" He asked curiously.

"She's back in my office. We were just having a cup of tea." She explained with a smile, as she continued to evaluate the both of them carefully.

"Harry dear, did you pick out those new glasses yourself? You look positively dashing in them," she said, gazing kindly at the boy.

Harry grinned at her, far more relaxed after hearing her very positive reaction.

"Come with me, boys. Let's go show Professor McGonagall how nice you both look," she said, suavely taking them each by an arm and leading them back to her office, where the smell of hot tea had begun floating enticingly out to their noses.

…

Minerva was simply flabbergasted at seeing Poppy return to the office with both Harry Potter and Severus Snape on either side of her.

They both looked unusually good, especially the boy. Poppy had mentioned something about Severus taking him shopping, but she hadn't realized how much of a difference it would make in his overall demeanor. He stood up straighter than she had ever seen him stand before, and there was a new air of calmness around him, which she felt would eventually turn into gentle confidence, if all continued well.

"So Mr. Potter," she said, starting the conversation out formally, "how does the world look to you on this Christmas Eve?"

Apparently it was the right question to ask, because after a shy look at Severus for permission, the boy had launched excitedly into a long tale of all that they had done and everything he now could see, and in general, basically just detailing how much more beautiful the world was now. There was something that sparkled in his eyes shining out of his new glasses that filled her with a quiet sort of joy.

_I look at this boy and I see the spirit of Christmas shining out at me through his face._

She found herself smiling back at him, before offering him the seat beside her and transfiguring another to allow Severus a place to sit as well, while Poppy went about offering them both tea.

"I must say Severus, you did a fine job in sprucing up his wardrobe," she said, lifting her cup in a small salute.

It seemed that the boy's shyness was spreading, as she suddenly found herself looking at a quietly beaming Severus Snape.

"Thank you," he said after a moment, inclining his head towards her. "But I cannot take all the credit; he selected the glasses on his own," Severus said, looking at the boy kindly.

Harry, not very surprisingly, was looking a little pink in the cheeks after hearing Severus indirectly compliment him in front of two other adults.

"Harry, did Severus make any mention of how obvious it is now that you are truly Lily's son?" Minerva asked, smiling a small sad smile at the boy. "I feel as though I can feel her radiance shining back out at me through your eyes."

The boy flushed a bright red at her words and seemed quite unable to answer, although he did nod yes at her question.

Taking mercy on him, she turned to Severus.

"Tell me Severus, are you prepared for Christmas? I believe that last year you mentioned something about hell fre—," she said, breaking off as he suddenly glared darkly at her. Strangely enough, she was comforted to see him look at her in that manner.

"I apologize Severus; I just wanted to make sure that you weren't under the _Imperius_ curse," she said with a smirk of her own.

Poppy was the only one to snort at her statement, given that the child had no knowledge of that curse, while Severus was apparently trying to fry her alive with just the furious look in his eyes.

"Just be happy that we would able to tell if something was off about your behavior, Severus," she said, by way of making amends. "Take Albus for instance," she said, dropping the volume of her voice significantly.

"Harry dear, please get the door," Poppy said in her silence.

Harry carefully put his tea down upon the desktop, before jumping to his feet to obey. While his back was turned, Minerva cocked her head at Poppy to ask if he should hear their conversation.

"If the castle speaks to him half as often as it does me, then he already knows that something is off with the headmaster," Severus said matter-of-factly.

"Pardon? What did you say about the castle speaking to him? And you too?" She asked dumbfounded.

Severus turned to look at Harry, who was once again seated.

"Harry, explain to Professor McGonagall about your talks with Jimmy," Severus said, shooting a derisive look at her.

Harry, clearly aware that something was afoot between his two professors, wisely remained silent and turned to Poppy for advice.

"Children," Poppy broke in then, sounding severe, before completely ruining the image by turning to Harry and explaining that by children, she didn't mean nice young men like him. "Am I going to be forced to separate you two?" She asked, returning to her previously stern demeanor.

Harry snorted into his tea, while Minerva huffed.

Bewilderingly, Severus just smiled wickedly at them all, while Harry began giggling madly.

"Oh for heaven's sake; Harry, explain what's so funny," she said, trying to regain her sense of composure with a strict glance, which oddly only caused the boy to giggle harder.

"Try telling her about me being a SLOB, Sev-or rather Professor Snape," he said, between bursts of laughter.

" _Severus!_ " she exclaimed, unsure of whether to laugh, as Poppy had just decided, or to be shocked.

"In the defiant words of a nice young man," Severus said, with a pointed look at Poppy, "' _am not scared!_ '" He managed to say it with a straight face, before decisively crossing his arms.

And then Severus stuck his tongue out at her and the world rapidly dissolved into giggles all around them.

…

Jimmy watched the four of them with more than a little amusement. It was nice to see them letting down their defenses and having a few laughs for once.

He was glad that they were growing closer, because he had a feeling that they would need each other to rely on when they finally had enough information to be outraged enough to approach the headmaster.

He looked in on them again, only to giggle to himself as Minerva began accusing Poppy of somehow spiking the tea with something.

The castle—or Jimmy rather (he was still getting used to that idea)—had experienced many Christmas Eves since having been initially constructed. Of those, he had various favorites, but in witnessing this year's occurrence, he started wondering whether he didn't have an all out winner. After all, how frequently did he get to see the Gryffindor and Slytherin heads of houses get together to do anything other than bicker or snipe?

Even more bizarre, as he continued watching with growing joy, was watching those two rival heads begin teaming up together in order to prank the other two present.

Poppy and the child were beginning to shoot each other concerned glances as Severus and Minerva continued to point at them with odd hand gestures and whisper intensely to each other.

…

Several harrowing, hilarious and downright weird hours later, the four of them finally adjourned to go to sleep. Not only was each of them still out of breath from having laughed more in one evening than any of them could remember, but they all now had one other important common characteristic: none of them had their original hair color.

Jimmy thought that was rather fitting.

Maybe he should change all of his dull gray corridors over to red and green.

Just for the next day.

He wondered whether Dumbledore would even notice.


	31. The First Christmas Stocking

Even though Harry had gone to sleep completely exhausted the night before, he still woke up at a relatively early hour the next day. He was glad that Severus had taught him how to tell time with his wand a few days before that.

He wondered if Severus would kill him if he got him up before six in the morning.

He thought it was probably likely, so he went to the bathroom that was down the hallway, and decided to brush his teeth, in order to waste some time.

However, having forgotten about the results of the previous evening's escapades, he abruptly found himself laughing out loud with fresh peals of hysterical laughter shortly after spelling the light on.

"Brat, what are you doing up, laughing to yourself like a hyena in the floor of the bathroom at this god forsaken hour?" Severus asked then, appearing at the doorway and breaking into his insanity, if only briefly, before Harry's eyes focused on the bright red of the man's hair, and he started laughing all over again.

They had agreed to leave things the way they were until right before the Christmas feast. Severus had also decided to extend an invitation to Minerva to join the three of them for breakfast that morning.

Personally, Harry thought that it was the least the man could do after turning the woman's hair green.

"Come on Harry, up off of the floor," Severus said, hauling the slowly calming boy up to his feet and laying a steadying hand on his shoulder as the room began swirling around his oxygen deprived brain.

"Is 5.20 too early to get up at on Christmas morning?" He asked as they made it into the now lit hallway.

"Yes," Severus said sternly, but he amended his statement as he saw the sudden sad look that had fallen across the blue haired boy's face. "Luckily for you, it's now 5.32; not that I would call that exactly an _acceptable_ hour, mind," he said in only slightly disgusted tones.

He had the boy by the arm by this point, and was gently leading him down the hallway to his room, in order to retrieve his forgotten slippers, before heading to the tree.

Harry suddenly clued into where Severus was taking him and began skipping happily, while Severus began muttering comments under his breath about being invaded by asinine hyper bunnies.

"Are you sure that Poppy didn't spike the tea with something?" He asked Severus just before he lit the main room's lights.

"Well she certainly wouldn't have if she had thought she would end up with glowing yellow hair by the end of the night," Severus said cryptically.

"That didn't at all answer my question," he argued.

"You're welcome," Severus answered oddly, as he lit the room with a brief flick of his wand.

And then all was forgotten as Harry stared in amazement at the room.

…

He watched the boy stare at the room as though he had never seen it before. He stared at everything as his gaze moved over the room in a slow arc. He stared at the tree that was now shining with Ever-Lit-Never-Drip floating candles in an array of different colored balls of light, greatly similar to their own hair colors.

Severus watched as the boy stared at the presents sitting under the tree. There weren't a multitude of presents by any means of the concept, but he could tell that the boy was plenty in awe by what _was_ there.

And then the boy's eyes made their way over to the fireplace, where a fire was already crackling merrily— _thank you Jayda_ , he thought silently—and hanging on the mantle, there hung a single stocking with the word "BRAT" stitched on the front in large letters. Each of the four letters was a different color: the "B" was blue, the "R" red, the "A" yellow, and finally, the "T" was green.

Harry turned and looked at him with a look of overwhelmed bewilderment.

"How did you do all of this?" Harry asked finally in a quietly shocked voice.

Severus was grateful that the child did not ask him _why_ he had done it. It was for that reason alone that he decided to be as honest as he could stand to be; hopefully _without_ resorting to sarcasm to make it through the explanation.

"Poppy and I have had plans in place since early December," he answered slowly, suddenly feeling not much more than a shy boy himself. He fought the urge to scowl at himself and continued on. "Minerva got involved on the day we took our shopping trip. And Jayda had expressed a desire to help from the very beginning. She has been very much enamored of you from the beginning."

_Only Jayda, Severus?_

He gave into the urge to scowl at himself and looked away for a moment so perhaps the bright eyed child wouldn't think it was directed at him.

"Jayda has not been the only one appreciative of your presence here." He made himself admit, putting his hands behind his back in order to restrain from shoving them in his pockets.

"In addition," he said, suddenly feeling the ridiculous urge to clear his throat nervously, "I have also been rather pleased by your continued company." There, he said something resembling the truth. He could go hide now.

He continued to feel discomfited up until the boy suddenly leapt forwards into his arms to hug him tightly.

"Thank you," the boy whispered as though he had somehow gotten the intent within Severus's awkwardly expressed statement. Then again, he had forgotten that the child _was_ highly perceptive of unsaid truths.

"Come lad," he said, taking the child by the arm once more, "let's investigate some of these presents of yours."

"You might have some too, Severus," the boy said, regaining his composure somewhat with a flippant grin.

"Brat," Severus said, showing the boy one of his rare smiles. "As I recall, children tend to root through their stockings first thing on Christmas morning," he mentioned as they walked further into the room.

"Like wild hyenas?" The boy quipped.

"No, that's only for little blue haired boys at 5.20 in the bloody morning," he said, still grinning. He was quite sure that he had never smiled as much as he had in the past week. It was an odd feeling.

"Go on; quit stalling," he nudged the boy with his hand, before taking a seat on the couch to watch as the child delicately picked his stocking off of the mantle and then carry it carefully back over to where Severus was sitting.

"Should I sit on the floor or on the couch?" Harry asked him, his voice beginning to sound bewildered once more.

"I believe that children have an inane tendency towards sitting on the floor; although if it were me, I would prefer to sit on the soft couch, as I am already doing." Severus answered like the smartass that he was.

"Couch then," the boy said, sitting down next to him.

Severus fought the desire to smile again, sarcastically thinking that he didn't want to risk wearing those muscles out too early in the bloody morning.

 _After all, they don't get much exercise_ , he thought feeling every bit as hysterical as the child sitting next to him who had yet to pull even one thing out of the stocking.

"Want to know the idiotic thought I just had about myself?" Severus asked the boy suddenly.

The boy clearly understood how rare it was to hear Severus say anything like that, because he immediately looked up at him.

"Probably wasn't as bad as the thought I just had," the boy said shakily.

"Hmm, I doubt that." He said softly. "I just found myself thinking about how much I've smiled today and yesterday as compared with most of my life."

"Yeah?" The boy asked curiously.

"That led to the thought that I should try to keep from smiling too much early on, since it's likely that those muscles are probably out of shape from lack of exercise." He admitted uncomfortably. "What was your thought?"

"I was thinking how pathetic it was for me to be getting my first ever stocking at 12 years old," the boy shrugged embarrassedly, sounding much the same.

"Hmm," he said, thinking.

"What if we're just both pathetic together?" The boy asked.

"Given that we're the only two in here, then that'd just mean that pathetic was normal," he said, trying to sound matter-of-factly about the inane conversation.

"So we're normal? I've never been normal before," the boy said, brightening.

"Me neither," Severus admitted, forgetting his previous discomfort as he noticed the increasing shine of the child's eyes.

The boy took a breath and then reached into the stocking and pulled out a long candy cane.

"Severus!" The boy exclaimed, as he realized the candy cane was longer than the length of the stocking itself.

"Wizarding space," he explained calmly.

"Cool!" The boy said looking at him in appreciation.

"What else is in there?" The child asked him mischievously.

"I'm not allowed to say." He said seriously.

"Who said?" The boy asked critically.

"Poppy."

"Oh, too bad," the boy said, accepting the truth for what it was.

"You could just keep pulling things out," he offered, slowly growing amused by the conversation.

The boy reached in again, before pulling out an oddly shaped whistle.

Severus thought it looked like a badly carved cat's head, but Minerva had shaken her head at him disapprovingly upon hearing his comment.

"Minerva claims that blowing the whistle will attract every cat in a 200 yard radius to your position within minutes. I must admit that I don't quite see the use in that, but she wanted you to have it." He said, still finding the need to shake his head at the gift.

The child shrugged, seemingly more amused at his explanation than the gift itself.

The boy reached in again and pulled out a felt bag that was small enough to fit into the palm of his hand.

"Ah that. That's from me." Severus said proudly. "It's a rare sample of moonseed that we came across in the Forbidden Forest nearly a year ago."

"We?" The boy asked interestedly.

"Hagrid."

"Cool. What's it used for?"

"This particular strain is invaluable in making potions."

"How so?" The boy asked questioningly.

"It cancels out the previous ingredient."

The boy's jaw literally dropped at his words, before he managed to quickly recover his dignity.

"How many are in here?" The boy asked softly; his eyes shining in wonder.

"17," he answered and got another pair of wide eyes in response.

"Thank you!" The boy said, impulsively hugging his neck before sitting back quickly.

"You know, the more often you do that, the less likely I am to accidentally hex you," Severus said with a small smirk.

"Good to know," the boy said, before reaching into the stocking again.

In the end, the stocking's booty included: the candy cane, a cat calling whistle, a small bag of moonseed—which Severus later informed him often went for as much as thirty or forty galleons _per_ _seed_ in Knockturn Alley—a set of Exploding Snap, a box of 8 waterproof firecrackers, a bag of Bertie's Botts Every Flavor Beans, a necklace strung with the tooth of a unicorn—Severus explained that Unicorn teeth increased mental focus in humans (as compared with death in amphibians)—and at the very bottom of it all, Harry discovered a tiny purple and yellow pet snake.

Thus, it was here that Severus got a surprise of his own.

…

Upon finding the beautiful little snake, Harry had let out a tiny soft squeal of joy.

Picking it up, he lifted the little snake up to eye level so that he could gaze more closely at it.

\Hi.\ He said to it shyly.

Beside him, Severus gasped softly, but the boy took no notice of him, as the snake spoke back to him, just like the boa had in the zoo.

\Hi.\ It said. \Are you my nessst mate?\

\No. I'm Harry. I'm just a boy.\

\Are you going to eat me?\ The little snake asked, suddenly seeming nervous.

\No. I'm going to take care of you.\ He promised solemnly.

\What isss that creature bessside you? Isss that _your_ nessst mate?\

Harry laughed while Severus looked at him curiously.

"She asked me if you were my nest mate," he said, grinning widely at Severus's sudden strange look.

"I do not envy your having to clarify _that_ problem," Severus said teasingly.

\No.\ the boy answered kindly after turning back to the snake. He was having trouble figuring out a word for what Severus was that the little snake might understand.

\Isss it your parent?\ The snake asked curiously in Harry's silence.

\Not exactly,\ he said with a frown. He tried to say teacher, but the only word that would come out was "parent." He finally settled on describing Severus as a "first-companion-then-parent." It was awkward, but it seemed to make the little snake understand—more or less.

\Odd.\ The snake said to his explanation. \That relationssship ssseemsss backwardsss to me.\

 _In more ways than you know_ , Harry thought grimly.

\Do you have a name?\ Harry asked, unsure of how else to explain about Severus.

\I wasss only born at sssunset yesssterday.\ The snake said, weaving its way around Harry's fingers.

 _Hmm,_ Harry thought carefully.

\Are you a girl or a boy?\ he asked then.

\Girl. And only a little one at that,\ she said shyly.

\How big will you get?\ he asked, suddenly wondering if the little snake would soon take over the quarters.

\When I am full grown, I will be nearly the length of thisss appendage,\ she said, indicating Harry's outstretched arm.

\That's my arm.\ he explained, impressed at the thought of her doubling in size.

\I think you're very beautiful.\ he added in admiration of her shining colors.

\I think _you're_ very beautiful as well.\ she said in appreciation of his newness in her world.

\May I name you?\ he asked.

\Pleassse. I ssshall trussst you to make it a good name.\ she said confidently towards him.

 _Uh oh_ , he thought worriedly.

"Severus," he said in a sudden panic, "she says that she's confident I'll pick a good name for her."

"She doesn't know you very well at all, does she?" Severus said with a smirk.

"Severus!"

"Why not name her after your mother? The lily _is_ typically a purple flower. You could call her 'Lillian,' to keep from getting them confused," Severus said tilting his head to look seriously at the boy.

The boy felt a lump in his throat at Severus's words. He wondered if Severus had picked the snake purely because he thought the purple color would remind them of Lily.

Severus took his free hand in his much larger hand and squeezed it gently, looking quietly at him as though he understood.

"Okay," Harry gulped. "That's a great idea," he said, as he turned back to the little snake.

\What did he sssay?\ the little snake asked, directing her tongue out at both of them.

\My first-companion-then-parent suggested I name you after my female parent. Her name was 'Lily,' but he suggested I call you 'Lillian,' which is a very similar name.\ He said solemnly.

\Isss ssshe dead?\ The little snake asked formally.

\She was killed, but not in order to be eaten.\ He said, making a face at how that had come out in the snake language.

He had tried to say that she had been murdered, but apparently that was another concept that didn't translate well. Thankfully, it seemed that his explanation had at least made it clear that her death had been without a greater cause—and therefore an unjust tragedy.

\I would be honored to carry a name honoring her then.\ the little snake stated.

\Then I shall call you Lillian.\ Harry said proudly, albeit a little sadly.

Harry looked at Severus as Lillian continued to explore his arm carefully. Severus was looking at him with a careful expression on his face, making Harry wonder if anything was wrong.

"Severus?"

"Harry, how long have you known that you could speak to snakes?" Severus asked him softly.

"Um," he said, thinking back again to that fateful day with the boa in the zoo. "Right before I came to Hogwarts, I accidentally let a boa loose on my cousin at the zoo by causing the glass to disappear. We talked for a bit before that. Why?"

"It is an exceedingly rare talent called 'Parseltongue.' In fact, it is so rare that the only other known Parseltongue of the last fifty years or more has been the Dark Lord himself," Severus said very seriously; already anticipating Harry's reaction by drawing the boy into an firm embrace directly after he finished speaking.

Harry didn't know if he could manage to speak again after hearing that news, and therefore was glad for the contact.

\Harry, what'sss wrong?\ Lillian asked him.

It suddenly seemed so very wrong to have named a snake after his mum, when it had been a snake of a man who had killed her.

\My first-companion-then-parent just told me—just told me how unusual it is that I can speak with you.\ He said, stumbling over his words as he shivered in Severus's arms.

\I _wasss_ sssurprisssed to have you conversssse with me, but I have decided that I like it. You sssmell honessst and true, which isss unusssual for walking creaturesss, ssso far asss I can tell.\

He smiled at her sincere compliments, feeling a little better, but was still happy to have the comforting weight of Severus's arms holding him as he slowly regained his equilibrium.


	32. Both of Them

Severus had been very shocked at hearing the parseltongue as it issued easily from the boy's lips, but slowly grew used to the sounds of the sibilant noises, especially as the boy's smile continued to grow.

He hadn't wanted to scare the child, but he couldn't bear the idea of the boy learning about it another harsher way, like through a callous classmate. He thought back to his first years at Hogwarts, and felt a bitter taste rise at the back of his throat when he remembered all the things that he had been forced to learn through the jeers and taunts of his classmates, as he fought to hide his feelings from them and his anger at himself for not knowing.

Not wishing to have his memories of that time taint his experience of the day, he pushed them away with a defiant mental glare and then looked back towards the boy who was once again halfway in his lap. The boy's snake, _Lillian_ – he thought with a sudden pain to his heart, was curled protectively around the fingers of the boy's left hand, seemingly waiting quietly until the boy regained his composure.

"Was it my imagination, or did you make mention of something about having a present for me?" Severus asked, deciding to play the fool to get the boy to smile once more.

It appeared to work, _unfortunately_ , his brain sighed, as the boy perked up almost instantly.

"Are we going to open the presents under the tree now?" He asked, looking at Severus expectantly.

"Only the ones that are addressed to us," he said, half-jokingly.

"Well yeah, of course!" The boy said, scrambling to get up to find presents inscribed to them.

Severus fought back a groan, but did not bother to stop himself from rolling his eyes at the boy's retreating backside.

"I take it you have some experience with this part of Christmas?" He asked, raising an eyebrow at the child.

"Last year!" The boy exclaimed happily, as he began pulling items out from under the tree.

Severus hoped that there wouldn't be too many addressed to himself. As he had determined over the years of being a Hogwarts professor, his colleagues had simply atrocious ideas about what items made acceptable Christmas presents for the seemingly dour potions master.

The boy, content to have found one for each of them, practically hopped back to the couch in his excitement.

 _Luckily, his snake stayed here with me and was able to forego that particular trait of the child's overly exuberant personality_ , he thought with amusement to himself.

Harry handed him a package and then sat down to his professor with not much more dignity than what a dead fish has when accidently dumped into a lake from the mouth of a bird flying overhead.

Severus took a quick look at what the child had picked up and was pleased to see the small package from the Quidditch supply store currently in his eager hands. Severus looked down at his own gift and noticed with some relief that it was signed by Poppy.

_At least her gifts are always entertaining, if not always useful._

He decided to wait until the boy had opened his present before undoing the simple wrapping paper that Poppy tended to prefer. He watched as Harry carefully tore the paper open, before finding a simple unadorned box which was about the size of Severus's palm and stood only two-thirds as high.

Severus was afraid that the plainness and size might deter the boy, but Harry only glanced at him with a quick intrigued grin, before carefully removing the top from the box itself. Inside, atop a commercially standard cushioning spell, sat a glass object in the shape of the Golden Snitch, only slightly larger, with a strange shimmery transparent look to its surfaces.

"Pick it up," Severus instructed, "and then tell it you are its owner."

"And then what?" The delighted, yet impatient, boy asked.

"Then you wait," Severus said with a slightly evil smirk.

The boy pursed his lips at him disapprovingly, but then quickly turned back to the gift and did as he was instructed. Within seconds of Harry's last word, the glass Snitch flickered once, before becoming animated. It fluttered its tiny glass wings valiantly in an effort to wrench itself free, causing Harry to look imploringly at Severus.

"Take it to your room and close the door while you speak the word 'home,' but don't release it yet. Bring it back here and I'll explain the rest." He said comfortably as the boy bounced up to obediently follow his latest instructions.

Harry was back on the couch in under a minute, his fingers still wrapped tightly around the flapping glass snitch.

"Now say the word, ' _On_ ,'" Severus said, visibly able to see the boy's growing excitement over what exactly the beautiful object in his hand was capable of.

"On," Harry said clearly. Then his mouth dropped open as the shimmering transparency disappeared under a kaleidoscopic effect of whirling, brightly colored lights that were now coming from within the empty glass sphere itself.

"Wow!" Harry said, upon regaining his speech.

"Now let it go," Severus said, pleased by the boy's reaction.

Harry hesitantly loosened his fingers from around the beautifully flashing snitch, and then watched in amazement as the snitch took off in flight around the room, filling its dark corners with briefly flashes of random colored lights, as it zoomed past them excitedly.

"It's absolutely wonderful Severus," the utterly enchanted boy said as he continued watching the vibrantly lit snitch quickly flit around the room, as it explored its new surroundings.

Severus had thought the boy would like it, but he hadn't quite accounted for this level of awe. In hearing the child's awestruck opinion of the man's gift, he felt the heat begin to rise in his cheeks. Fortunately, the boy did not look at him again until the heated feeling had already passed from Severus's face.

Finally tearing his eyes away from the beautiful toy, Harry turned and looked at Severus with shining eyes.

"What'd you get from Poppy?" he asked, reminding Severus of his own gift.

"Allow me to open it," Severus said calmly, as he began tearing off the wrapping paper to reveal a hardback book. "Apparently it is a guide to better understanding the laws and rules of ancient magical rituals," he said, raising an eyebrow in appreciation before carefully putting the book down on his leg, and vanishing the paper.

"I think I know what you'll be looking at later on," the boy said with a knowing grin, as he picked up the now sleeping snake off of Severus's shoulder, where the man had put the little one for safe keeping. The boy wrapped her around his fingers once more, presumably to keep from losing the little purple and yellow snake.

"Meanwhile, you will most likely be gazing intently up into the interior of your eyelids," Severus said a moment later, with a triumphant smirk at the child.

"Well, they are pretty interesting," the boy said, trying to sound serious.

"Brat."

Harry stuck his tongue out at him, before Severus turned him back around to the tree with a light nudge.

"Maybe it was a good idea to get up ridiculously and _disgustingly_ early this morning. At this rate, we shall be done by March," he said loudly, only to have Harry shoot him a proud grin at evoking his apparent ire.

"Oh Merlin," he groaned purposely loud enough for the child to hear. "Save me from the supposed wit of twelve year old wizards at least until _after_ I've had my morning caffeine," he finished, sighing dramatically.

"Shut it you," Harry said, coming back from the tree and lightly dropping into Severus's lap, missing the book on his knee by scant millimeters.

"Oof," Severus huffed loudly at the invasion of his lap by his SLOB.

"There is a SLOB in my lap," he said in mock surprise. "Actually, let me correct myself; there is a _blue haired_ SLOB in my lap," he said, sounding somewhat disturbed now.

"Could be worse," the boy grinned, "you could have a red haired Severus under your rump," he said, giggling a little as Severus growled at him menacingly until he started opening his gift. It turned out to be a new green sweater from Mrs. Weasley; this time adorned with a golden snitch!

Harry grinned happily at the sweater before pulling it on over his pajama top.

"Open yours now," he instructed, shoving a long and narrow box at him, and then scooting backwards onto Severus's right leg, and propping himself against the arm of the couch in order to better see.

Severus carefully noted that the present had come from the boy, making him wonder how he had gotten it when they had been together nearly constantly for the past two weeks.

He opened the box to reveal a new quill, but quite unlike any he had seen before. It was shaped in the tradition fashion, but its color was a most unusual mix of green and blue tones, tastefully arranged in an aesthetically pleasing display across the individual feathers.

"It's the color of your bedspread, and the couch, and that mug you always drink out of," the boy said shyly.

"So that's why you and Poppy had so many color spells at hand," he said in sudden understanding of the previous night's debacles.

"Poppy says that the color is called 'cerulean,'" the boy purposely continued, clearly not willing to admit to anything without his co-conspirator nearby.

"It is indeed," Severus said, nodding his head thoughtfully.

"Also, the quill is charmed to always write in that color, regardless of the original color of ink that you are using," the boy said, obviously proud of the gift.

"Ingenious," the man said, looking at the boy still perched in his lap.

The child gave him a gentle smile, before shyly dropping his eyes to look back down at the little snake that had now wrapped itself around the thumb and index finger of his left hand.

"Would you like to know why I favor this color?" He asked the boy softly.

"Very much so," the boy said, nodding his head.

"Not only was it my mother's favorite color, but she also gave it to me as a middle name," Severus shared solemnly.

"Severus Cerulean Snape! That's brilliant!" The boy gushed happily at him.

He smiled back at the boy before using his wand to summon the other assortment of presents over to them.

Harry caught one of them in the air easily, looking at the inscription and then back at Severus with a questioning look on his face. Severus looked over to which one the boy had snagged and realized that it was the thin, plainly wrapped rectangular gift that was addressed to them both.

"Go on," he encouraged, "open it."

Severus began to feel his heart pick up speed as the child opened it slowly, clearly understanding that something unusual was afoot with the nondescript looking present.

As the wrapping paper slowly fell away, Severus felt time stop around the bubble that they were seemingly sitting in.

…

Harry touched one trembling finger to the glass front of the framed certificate in complete disbelief at what he was seeing. His jumbled brain seemed to be picking up phrases at random as he scanned his eyes jerkily over the words: _Severus Cerulean Snape . . . day of the 25_ _th_ _, in the month of December . . . Harry James Potter . . . LEGALLY ADOPTED etc._

"For real?" He squeaked at the man, not daring to believe it until he heard actual confirmation from Severus himself.

"If it's okay with you, Harry," Severus said, gently touching his shoulder and looking quietly at him.

He felt himself nodding as tears clouded his eyes, before the blank shock of his mind suddenly snapped and he had the man by the neck tightly, just holding on hard while he dropped hot tears on the man's shoulder. As he cried, he began to feel something that had been knotted tightly within him begin to release slowly into the hushed world around him.


	33. Daddy Snape

Severus looked at the child— _his_ child—who was now calmly sitting beside him, tightly holding onto his hand. Half an hour before, Harry had unwrapped the adoption certificate, and now they were sitting together, slowly figuring things out.

The child's snake had slithered away to go bask near the warm hearth after the boy had explained to her what was happening. Apparently she understood that theirs was an unusual situation, and had the decorum to leave them to it.

Severus wasn't yet used to thinking of snakes as sentient members of the family, but as Harry had already shown him on more than one occasion, his way of thought was not the only correct way of going about business.

"What's my last name now?" Harry asked, looking up at him curiously.

"You can keep Potter, or go with Snape, or combine the two if you really want," he said easily enough.

"Can I change my entire name?"

He hadn't exactly been expecting to hear _that_ question.

"Maybe," he said cautiously. "If you can explain to me the reasoning behind it," he said, thinking that the request was sensible enough.

"How would we make it legal?" The boy asked, still not telling him anything.

"There's a section of the adoption paperwork that I have in my bedroom that we would fill out. In turn, since these are wizarding legal forms, the original copy will automatically transfer to all of the other forms involved in the process."

Severus was glad that he had researched that potential step.

The boy was silent again.

Severus was ridiculously glad that the boy had seemed to have no problems with being adopted by the "greasy git" of the dungeons. However, he would have been more comforted if the child would begin speaking to him again sometime in the near future.

 _Like now,_ his brain quipped.

Thankfully, the boy finally looked up at him and grinned shyly, before leaning in closer to the man.

"I wanna change my last name to Snape," he said first.

 _Okay, Harry James Snape isn't too bad_ , he thought carefully.

"And I want to know if it's okay if I can use your middle name for mine too," the boy said hesitantly.

"Of course," he said, beginning to feel a little overwhelmed himself.

 _Harry Cerulean Snape_ sounded . . . off.

"And I also want to change my first name to Lee," the boy said in a rush.

"I believe that I need an explanation on that one," Severus said looking at the child in confusion, not at all understanding where the lad had come up with that particular name.

"I've been thinking about this for a while," the child admitted, scrunching farther down into the couch.

"Indeed. Do tell," Severus said as he gently pulled the child back upright into a more typical sitting position.

"Before my mum got married," the boy started off slowly, "her name was Lily Evans, right?" He asked, looking expectantly up into Severus's face.

"Correct," he confirmed.

"So her initials were L.E." the boy said. "And then when we went and got my glasses a few days ago, Dr. Lentz mentioned that your mum's first name was Eileen," he said, pausing for a breath. "Thus, Lee is a combination of my mum's initials with the first letter of your mum's name. _Also,_ I realized that 'lee' is in the middle of the name 'Eileen.' I just wanted a way to have another connection with my family, but also with yours," the boy said, suddenly pink in the face and shrinking again.

Severus wondered when the boy had had the time to do all of that thinking.

_Likely he used the same time that you were filling out forms._

In addition, he was more than a little touched that the child wanted so many connections to him, but he also found the boy's desire to remember his mother within his everyday life as an extremely honorable idea.

"I noticed that you have left your father's name completely out of your new one," he said carefully, trying not to influence the boy's decision with his own leftover bitterness.

At Severus's comment though, the boy's eyes grew hard and he clenched his jaw for a moment before relaxing somewhat.

"What is it child?" Severus asked, more than a little concerned for the boy.

"Jimmy told me what they were like in school—him and his friends. He told me what kind of sh—crap they used to do to you. It pisses me off so much that my _father_ was remembered so well, regardless of having made so many of his classmates' lives miserable. Jimmy's description made me think of Dudley, except for the fact that Dudley never had access to magic," the boy said vehemently, his voice tinged with animosity from undoubtedly hundreds of horrible memories involving the larger cruel boy.

Severus felt himself completely torn from both wanting to agree wholeheartedly with the boy, yet also not wanting him to write his father completely off— _the man whom Lily had eventually loved—_ without taking into account what the man had been like after Hogwarts.

"Child," he said, somewhat pained after thinking these thoughts through— _twice_ , "do not fail to take into account the fact that your mother fell in love with the man that he later grew into."

 _There,_ he thought more bitterly than before, _I gave an honest effort to show him both sides._ He dearly hoped that Lily had seen it.

"Severus," the boy said, turning to look him full in the face, his eyes far too sad looking considering his age. "I get that you're trying to do my mum's memory some justice, but just—please stop. James Potter had no reason to be the cruel ass that he was. He had it all. He had the social standing, the looks, the friends, the brains . . .," the boy said, trailing off to grab Severus's other hand. "James Potter was hurtful to other people because he _liked it_ , because he thought it was _funny_." The boy said derisively, looking furious about the idea, even while his lip trembled and his eyes filled with tears.

Severus felt like he was listening to a younger version of himself. He had said all of that to Dumbledore and more, and nothing had come of it. And yet, here was his adopted son coming to the same conclusions after only hearing _stories_ about the man, more than fifteen years after the fact.

This time, Severus was the one who felt as though he needed the hug. So he pulled the child in tightly and just listened to the sounds of both of their hearts beating together.

When he finally released the boy, he noticed that they were both a great deal calmer.

"Okay Harry," he said one last time to the boy who was now his son. "I fully accept the reasons for your new name. From now on your name is Lee Cerulean Snape," he said, standing up and offering the boy his hand. The child latched onto him and Severus pulled him up easily.

"Let's go sign some forms."


	34. Breakfast With the Girls

They had decided to put off the opening of the rest of their presents until later in the day, preferably _after_ putting some caloric objects into each of their depleted systems.

After all, they had both already gotten what they most wanted. It seemed of little consequence to open any of the other presents within a set timeframe now.

…

Both Minerva and Poppy showed up at Severus's quarters promptly at 8.30 that morning.

Although they were both smiling, it was more than a little obvious that Minerva was still a bit annoyed at Severus for the green.

From beside him, his child's bright blue hair was easily evident from anywhere in the room; in fact, as Severus had kidded the boy, his hair was so bright, it could almost be seen through walls. Lee— _which he was trying to get used to thinking of the boy as now_ —had responded by tackling him and tickling him. Unfortunately—for _Severus_ —his son had discovered that Severus did in fact have a few ticklish spots, and had taken care of the older man sufficiently until Severus had been able to get enough breath to put him in a body bind.

Severus knew Poppy was aware of the adoption situation since her brother had been the one to get the entire thing processed. He regularly acted as a liaison between the muggle and the wizarding legal systems. On the muggle side of affairs, he primarily worked as a judge, and thanks to the extra contacts that he had from the wizarding world, he managed to have a fair amount of pull in both worlds.

He had managed to cut through most of the incredible red tape involved in removing a wizarding child from his unfit muggle relatives in near record time. It was not something that happened often, but it did still have to be done occasionally. It usually occurred because the muggle relatives had proven to pose significant risk, or risks, to the wellbeing of the untrained magical child.

He had been surprised that Harry's—or rather, Lee's—home situation had not been investigated before that year. All Poppy had had to do was show her brother her medical files, and that been enough to get immediate action, especially since there was someone who was interested in adopting the boy.

Moreover, Poppy had told him in private that her brother was more than a little infuriated that the "savior of the wizarding world," had been treated so shabbily. Severus, who had thought nearly the same thing earlier that term, couldn't have agreed more.

Minerva, however, had not yet been apprised of the situation, but Severus intended to rectify that before much longer.

"Ah, Minerva!" He said, trying to sound cheerful.

"What do you want Severus?" Minerva growled; her hands on her hips as she looked scathingly at him.

"I want to introduce you to someone." He said, gently nudging the small blue haired boy forwards unobtrusively with his foot. They had discussed this beforehand in order to try for optimum shock value.

"Harry, tell him that I'm not _that_ senile!" She said with a flamboyant roll of her eyes.

"Who?" Lee asked politely.

"Wonderful!" She said, throwing her hands up into the air in disgust. "Now Severus has you in on it too!"

Poppy was standing farther back from Minerva and was obviously having trouble keeping a straight face as their antics progressed.

"Okay," Minerva grumbled, "I'll play along," she said, briefly slumping in defeat, before taking Lee's hand and inquiring about his name.

"Hi. I'm Lee," the child said grinning impishly up at her.

"That's sweet," she said, releasing his hand and turning to Severus with an icy expression on her face. "What's the gag Severus?"

"Try directing Mr. Potter to do something," he said with an innocent look plastered across his face. He had the framed adoption certificate in his hands behind his back. As promised, the child's name had already been changed. Idly he wondered how long it would take before the news hit The Daily Prophet.

"Mr. Potter, I hereby order you to explain what's going on!" She said with a fierce gaze across her face.

Lee played his part perfectly by staring up at her in apparent confusion.

She raised an eyebrow at him.

"You have funny hair," he said, laughing out loud for a moment. Behind Minerva, Poppy had literally shoved her fist partially in her mouth to keep from laughing out loud, and her face was turning pink as a result.

Severus just stared at them all with a wide eyed look on his face as if he didn't have the slightest clue as to what was happening.

"Okay, one last try," Minerva said, reaching a hand out to grasp Lee's. "I'm Professor McGonagall. What's your last name?" She said with a slightly hysterical look in her eyes that indicated worse things would begin occurring than just some dyed locks if she didn't get some answers soon.

"Snape," Lee said with a proud smile, before stepping backwards next to Severus.

Minerva's face was now a cross between bewildered and accusatory. She was also currently fixing both looks at Severus.

"Like I said before Minerva, let me introduce you to someone. This is Lee Snape, my son," he said in a solemn voice, handing her the framed certificate, and then putting an arm around the boy's shoulders.

Minerva looked down at the official Certificate of Adoption that she was now holding in her hands, before looking up again at them. She repeated the process several more times in shorter and shorter increments until finally fixing a wary look at Severus.

"Is this real Severus?" She asked in a hushed tone, putting the precious document down on the table beside her.

Beside him, Lee snickered in response to her question, after having asked nearly the same question earlier that morning.

"Quite so," Severus said, pulling himself up to his full height and gazing seriously into her eyes.

"I suggest we begin breakfast as Severus explains," Poppy interjected after finally getting her composure back.

…

Poppy watched the interaction between her other brightly haired miscreants while they ate breakfast and Severus gave a short explanation of what had transpired from behind the scenes, as well as what it meant now for the child who was officially his son. Plus, he outlined the process of how and why Harry's name was now so dramatically different.

Everything had fairly well settled down until Lee asked a question that rocked the entire table.

"Daddy, can I wear blue spikes in my hair to the feast?"

She watched as Severus nearly choked on his tea at the word "daddy;" an obvious indication to her that the boy was trying it out for the first time that day. She thought it unlikely that he would have any trouble with the idea of the blue spikes once his poor brain got past the other issue currently wreaking havoc in his cortex.

"Yes Severus," Minerva said with a nefarious glint in her eyes, "you could wear red spikes in your hair as well, in order to demonstrate your link to the boy." She smiled evilly at him, fluttering her eyelashes coquettishly.

Severus shot her a dark glare before turning to his child.

"Lee, remember that talk we had about how the more times you hug me, the less I'm likely to hex you?"

Poppy laughed to herself quietly, wishing she could have witnessed _that_ conversation personally.

"Yup," Lee nodded, the glint of his eyes making it obvious that he had dropped that bombshell of a word on purpose at that particular moment for just this effect.

"Same principle," the man said before dropping his head into his hands.

 _Rather like a man with a horrible hangover,_ Poppy thought with amusement, before turning to the boy to congratulate him.

"Oh Lee," Poppy gushed, "what a sneaky little Gryffindor you're turning out to be!"

The boy brightened, straightening in his chair and puffing up proudly at her words.

"You know, the Sorting Hat nearly put me in Slytherin," he said casually dropping bombshell number two in as many minutes.

"You managed to convince it otherwise?" His father asked incredulously, the boy's words clearly having gotten his full attention.

"Yes sir," the boy said with a merry look in his eyes.

"I had rather thought that to be impossible," the man muttered absently.

"So, spikes?" The boy prompted again to Severus.

"For whom are you asking about?" Severus asked narrowing his eyes at the child suspiciously.

"Me, Severus!" the boy said excitedly, as he pulled on his father's arm energetically.

"It does not come off," Severus said looking down at the arm his son was repeatedly pulling on.

"Oops, sorry sir," Lee said apologetically.

Severus looked at the child for a moment before sighing and standing up.

"Come, brat. Let's determine whether my wand skills are up to this decisively ridiculous request," he said, before stalking off darkly down the hallway.

With a whoop, Lee jumped up, and then chased after him.

"Well, I tried," Minerva said, with a snort of her own, while a brightly shining glass snitch fluttered happily in the background.


	35. Feast

After Severus had used his wand to mold some of Lee's hair into six or seven randomly distributed short blue spikes, he reversed the spell on the rest of the boy's hair so that the bright blue was offset by the original black color.

Lee had then hugged and thanked him profusely while Severus had smirked in a pleased fashion at the child.

…

"Found her!" Lee called out excitedly, as he carried his snake back over to show to the two older women. He had wanted to show the women his Christmas present, but hadn't initially been able to locate her.

Lee perched Lillian onto his shoulder, like Severus had, while thinking that the little purple and yellow snake went well with the blue in his hair.

"We discovered this morning that Lee has the rare gift of being able to speak with his pet snake in Parseltongue," Severus said proudly, putting an arm around Lee's shoulders in support, staring at the other two with a menacing look, as though daring them to speak critically of the boy's ability.

"What's her name, Lee?" Poppy asked in Minerva's hesitant silence.

"Lillian," the boy said shyly, not at all sure of what the reception would be to their choice of name.

"A lovely name for a lovely snake," Minerva said warmly to the boy after finally recovering herself from the mention of the Parseltongue.

"I've always enjoyed the color purple myself," Poppy said approvingly towards them both.

Lee beamed proudly while Severus's challenging look faded into something much softer as he gazed at the pleased boy next to him.

…

It was clear from the sudden drop in volume level following their entrance into the Great Hall that no one had ever expected to see Professor Snape holding a child's hand and still manage to look _happy_ about it. Compared to that, the fact that the boy had his hair in bright blue spikes didn't even seem to be noticed by most of the students.

By the time they had made it halfway across the hall, the volume had gone back up to its previously excited state, but Severus could still see several pointed glances being furtively cast their way. Thankfully, the three adults all _had_ changed their hair back to normal before exiting Severus's quarters.

Jimmy had warned him that Dumbledore had been rather less responsive than usual, but grouchier towards the things that did manage to catch his attention.

Thus as with many other moments in Severus's life, he realized that the feast would probably go one of two ways: acceptable or extremely unpleasant. While he was prepared for either outcome, he hoped that for the sake of the boy, everything would go smoothly for once.

 _Just once_ , he thought beseechingly to the fates that had always seemed to play havoc with his life.

Finally arriving at the head table, they quickly took their seats just before Dumbledore stood up to welcome everyone who had stayed at Hogwarts to the annual Christmas feast.

"The Great Hall looked magnificent. Not only were there a dozen frost-covered Christmas trees and thick streamers of holy and mistletoe crisscrossing the ceiling, but enchanted snow was falling, warm and dry, from the ceiling." - p. 212 of the hardback version of HPCS

Severus watched as mounds of food appeared all around them. Beside him, Lee looked flummoxed from the multitude of choices that were now available.

Thinking back to how the boy had begun copying him at mealtimes, Severus began choosing selections. Within a minute, the child had noticed and proceeded to follow his lead. Severus had noticed that thanks to his irredeemable horse manure excuses for relatives, Lee had little experience with eating balanced meals. In addition, the child was also unfamiliar with foods that should have been standard knowledge to a boy of his background.

Luckily, the boy was willing to try anything, provided that Severus took a bite first, and after years of nearly starving, he tended not to be very picky about much of anything.

 _Or at least,_ Severus thought with a frown, _he tends not to make mention of his dislike_.

At first, Severus had appreciated the boy's lack of complaint about the food that was put before him, but now, after coming to understand more about his son's sordid and infuriating history, it had begun bothering Severus that the boy _was_ as obedient and compliant as he was. He wanted the lad to feel safe enough to complain and express his needs, _as well as wants_ , just like any other child would without a second thought.

It didn't mean that Severus would instantly give him all that he desired, but just being able to learn that the child desired _something_ would relieve some of the fears that he had about the lasting effects of the trauma experienced from years spent with his damnable relatives.

Lee's nightmares had slacked off significantly for the past two weeks, but it was likely just a result of how the lad felt safe when he was around Severus, in addition to the significant drop in overall stress levels from not being in class every day.

"Severus?" Lee's voice asked softly, bringing him out of thoughts.

"Child?"

"What's wrong?" Lee was looking at him worriedly.

Severus noted that the two women sitting to the other side of the boy were wrapped up in some kind of very complex conversation about snake venom, which might have typically sparked his interest, if not for the look on his son's face.

"Why do you ask?" He asked, speaking just as softly, not wanting to draw attention either.

"You were frowning," the child said.

"I always frown," Severus pointed out.

"Not true. Anyways, I know your frown really well, and that look wasn't it. This was scarier, but sadder too," the child said thoughtfully. "Why are you sad?"

_Where would you like me to start?_

"Why are you not?" The words tumbled out of Severus's mouth accidentally. "I apologize," he said quickly. "I do not know—," he began saying uncomfortably until his son cut him off with a direct look almost as good as one of his.

"I suppose," the boy said, looking down at his cutlery, "it's just a matter of perspective."

Severus looked at him, an eyebrow propped upwards.

"For _example_ ," Lee said looking sternly at him, "the first person who ever talked to me, you know, talked _to me_ , instead _at_ me or _about_ me, was this old homeless guy who used to hang around the neighborhood near my primary school."

"Child," Severus started to say painfully, before being cut off with another harsh look from his son.

 _His son—_ there was a phrase that he had not ever expected to be hearing, even from within his own head.

"I think the guy recognized that we were more or less on the same level of life's shit scale. He told me that plenty of folks saw him as worthless too, but that didn't mean _he_ had to think of himself like that. He helped me out some too, like rescuing me from more than a couple of different beatings from the other kids. Mostly though," the boy looked back down at his plate once more, "he was the only one up through that part of my life that didn't yell at me or make me feel bad about myself."

Something in the boy's eyes had turned flinty and Severus felt that there was something that he was leaving out.

"What happened to him?" He asked cautiously.

"They said that he drank himself to death, but they didn't know that I saw the knife," the boy said in a whisper, looking at Severus with haunted eyes.

"I suddenly do not feel the need to put up with staying in this room for any longer," Severus said, no longer having the desire to be surrounded by a roomful of numerous sets of small inquisitive eyes. "If you like, Jayda can bring us dessert, but I think we are need of a longer conversation, and preferably without the possibility of being overheard."

"Sure," the boy whispered, still sounding frighteningly distant to Severus.

And that was that. They stood up with a promise to see the two ladies later, but for now, they needed some privacy.


	36. Perspectives

Severus looked the boy sitting next to him on the couch in his quarters.

"How old were you when you made friends with this man?" He inquired of the pale boy next to him.

"Six."

"Did he ever try to—," the man tried to ask about if the bum had ever done anything inappropriate with the child, but his son was already shaking his head in the negative.

"Once he saw uncle Vernon hit me hard enough to knock out a tooth, but unfortunately, uncle Vernon saw him too," the lad said quietly. "After that, he was always trying to get something done about what he'd seen, but no one was willing to listen to him."

"Except for his murderer," Severus said, putting the pieces together.

"Aunt Petunia got angry at me the next day because she couldn't find one of her knives, while uncle Vernon just leered at me the whole time," the boy said, shivering because of the memory.

Severus draped an arm carefully around him, not wanting to spook the boy as he relived the unpleasant experience.

"Child, I am finding myself at somewhat of a loss as to why you thought that account would help me towards understanding why you are not unhappy." Severus asked after a moment. "It seems as though your past is filled with tragedies and horrors similar in nature to this exact memory."

The boy sat in silent contemplation while Severus waited patiently for a response.

"I suppose that I told you that memory so that you would be forced to ask me why."

"Explain," Severus said as his eyes narrowed in confusion.

"It says something about my life if the first person to ever try to help me was a homeless half-drunk guy, right?"

Severus nodded, still not understanding.

"At the time, it was a new experience for me to have someone— _anyone_ bother to care," the child said, looking up from his hands to gaze steadily at Severus.

"But now I have you," his son said with a slow smile. "So how can I not be happy?"

Severus found himself speechless. It was a shock to hear the boy detail how much Severus had done for him, but the sly, underhanded manner in which was delivered made Severus realize how very well the boy understood him.

Severus pulled the boy into his lap and hugged him fiercely while resting a cheek against the soft head—thankfully having already flattened the spikes. The child pushed himself back firmly against Severus's chest, obviously relishing the hug for what it was.

They stayed like that for a while, during which Severus found himself wondering at the special small life he had in his arms. Once more, he found himself mentally swearing to do right by the child. He wasn't sure whom the words were directed at, but a small part of his soul prayed that Lily might see them and take comfort that her child was finally being protected.

After releasing him, but not putting the boy down as of yet, Severus thought of something to finally say.

"Lee, may I ask why you opted to change your entire name?" He asked tentatively.

He felt the boy tense ever so slightly from where he was still leaning against Severus's chest, before relaxing once more.

"The child 'Harry James Potter' died with his parents," the child said in a hard slow voice. "Whatever that child would have been, or could have been, won't ever happen now, because the dreamers of that idea are dead," he said.

Severus's arms tightened slightly around the boy in reaction to his cold voice.

"From the night they died until I arrived at Hogwarts, the boy who existed was nothing more than a ghost, a scapegoat, a monster and a victim. And then I got to Hogwarts, and Harry Potter turned out to be a legend and a celebrity as well, but not a person or even a kid. I spent most of my life being despised for existing, and I've spent the last year and a half in much the same way, only now I have to suffer through the blind admiration too. Either way, I don't remember doing it, I don't remember my parents, and I'm bloody weary of everyone dumping their shit on me. Everyone expects me to be a certain way; the Dursley's expect me to moronic and clumsy, while everyone usually thinks I'll just be brilliant and arrogant."

Severus felt his heart crinkle into itself at hearing the child's bitterly cold words.

The boy turned himself around in his lap so that they were once again looking each other in the eyes.

"I just wanna be Lee now," the boy said, tears beginning to make their way past the chill of his previous tone. "I just wanna be a kid now. I don't wanna take care of myself no more," he said, speaking in a very small child's voice. He threw his arms around Severus's neck and Severus held on for dear life as his insides fought to overcome the pain from the boy's declaration.

"Please don't leave me Daddy, please don't," his son whispered desperately in his ear as his tears began.

"Hush child. _I_ will _never_ leave you. _I_ will _never_ forsake or betray you. You are _mine_ , do you hear me? _Mine_ ," he roughly ground out to the child, the boy who had continued to steal his heart piece by piece.

He was now rocking back and forth with the boy against his chest, one of his hands cradling the back of the boy's head, while the other was pulled tight across the child's back.

With more than a little surprise, he realized that he himself had started to cry quietly as well over the seemingly insurmountable emotions waging war within them both.

…

Jimmy looked over them both sadly, but proud that his potions master had finally proclaimed his fierce devotion for the child.

Over in a far dark corner of the room, Jimmy saw that the little blinking Snitch was bobbing unobtrusively out of the way. He gave a smile and the Snitch did a little figure eight to show that it had seen.

Ooo _Sad_ ooO – it blinked at Jimmy.

\But good\ Lillian pointed out from where she was curled up next to the warm fire.

 _Sad, but necessary_ , Jimmy agreed.

Jimmy was unable to communicate with very many of the humans at one time, but there seemed to be no limit of the number of objects and animals that he could, and did, often speak with.

He had seen so many Christmases where this same man had just drunk morosely to himself, often looking through photos of a much younger red haired Lily as he did, until finally being overcome with such incredible guilt and remorse for actions long past, that he had been forced to adjourn and finish the holiday with a supplication of dreamless sleep.

Yes, this was much better.

The two were still clasped tightly together, but it did seem as though the tears were finally drying up.

Severus, apparently realizing the same, stood up with the boy still in his arms and headed for his bed to lie down for the nap they both needed.

Yes, much better.

Jimmy just wished that all relationships within the castle were as hopeful as this one was turning out to be.

…

Ron was screaming again.

Or still.

Maybe he had always screamed, and he just couldn't remember.

He couldn't tell if what he was seeing in front of his eyes was real or just a nightmare.

Actually, it was far too possible that reality _was_ the nightmare.

He was staring at the floor dead eyed, and Lucius was fucking Blaise.

No wait, Lucius had fucked Harry, and _he_ had fucked Blaise.

But what if Lucius _had_ fucked him and Blaise really _was_ dead?

He could see it clearly in his mind, or dream, or reality or something.

He was only half-conscious at the time, but Lucius had kept up his incessant nattering all the same. And then he had bitten his nipple hard enough to bleed, but Harry's he had spit out of his mouth and laughed at the blood streaming down his ears—no, that was wrong.

 _Oh Merlin_.

He _had_ been fucked violently by Lucius. And Lucius _had_ bitten his nipple; that was he was absolutely sure of, but because of the bandages, he couldn't tell if he had taken it off completely.

He remembered Lucius drawing his nails—no they were more like sharpened claws—through the furrows of his hips and between the lines of his ribs.

And he remembered screaming, finally he had screamed, because he remembered Lucius's laugh that had followed.

But he hadn't screamed at the pain.

He had screamed at the words that Lucius was practically gnawing into his neck with.

" _Should have kept you around and fucked you blind while little Harry watched. Maybe we could have talked him into joining in. Just think, I could have fucked him while he fucked you and you could have been the one to take that little mudblood's cherry. Can't you just see her wide eyes as you pounded your dick into her tight little cunt, like I'm doing to you now?"_

And on and on he had gone, pounding and talking, like he could have literally kept it up all night.

He hadn't felt it when Lucius had come, but he had seen the blood on the man's dick, because he had been forced to clean it off with only his tongue.

" _What I can't understand is why your ass of a father keeps fucking your mother. After seven births, you can probably fit your entire fist in. Maybe I should find out._ "

And Ron had choked as Lucius sat down on his chest and began rutting against him, as he _continued_ to talk.

" _Maybe I should take pictures so your parents have something to work up to. Just think; you could turn into the family fuck. Everyone comes to Ron, if only to come_ in _Ron."_ The man had laughed endlessly at that one.

He hadn't been able to breathe against the heavy weight pushing itself against his chest and lungs.

" _Maybe I'll call up your dear old dad and see if he wants in on the excitement. He could bring your sister and we could introduce her to all of your companions here,"_ Lucius had said, gesturing at the gaunt remnants of grinning, fucking ghouls that were currently at work around them.

His vision had begun turning black when Lucius had said something that hadn't meant anything then, but was only contributing to his torment now.

" _I don't give a damn if you pass out; either way, I'm going to fuck you until I can feel the pull of your entrails against my dick._ "

This time he screamed until he began vomiting, irrationally trying to get the taste out of his mouth, out of his body, out of his mind.

And people had rushed around him as he did so, but all he could see in front of him was that cruel blond haired demon, laughing as he continued to repeatedly rape him.

And Harry.

And Blaise.

And all of the other boys who had been lost in that place with him.


	37. Far Too Awful

Blaise Zabini, the second year Slytherin student, who had initially disappeared with Ron Weasley more than two weeks before Christmas, was undeniably, horribly, and irrevocably dead.

Severus stood before the boy's remains in a back cornered off portion of the infirmary. The child's desiccated remains had been found on the castle grounds by Hagrid, just outside of the apparition point.

Poppy had contacted him early that morning to come and identify the body. Her face had been white as chalk, her eyes unblinking as she had harshly warned him against bringing Lee with him.

He had been able to see that merely from her face, but he did not educate her about that, not at a time as horrendous as this.

Severus had left the boy with Minerva back in his quarters; initially thinking him barely awake, yet the child had come and hugged him tightly on the way out the door with an admonishment to be careful. On any other day, Minerva would have likely looked amusingly on at that scene, but that morning she had only nodded her head at him, silently echoing the boy's sentiments.

And now he was standing here, in front of a boy who had been the same age and year as his _son_.

Severus allowed his eyes to travel slowly over the child's body, mentally cataloguing each detail fastidiously. When he reached Zabini's mid-section and groin, his insides began twisting painfully as his eyes and brain fought to make sense out of the mutilated scraps still present on the skeletal frame.

There was a vast gaping maw where the boy's anal cavity had once existed. It was large enough to put both of his fists into, side-by-side. Peering closer, Severus was able to see pieces of Zabini's spine, as well as the graying shriveled edges of intestines and perhaps part of a kidney.

Opposite that were the boy's sexual organs— _or_ _at least what was left of them_ , he dimly thought.

One of the similarities that were shared between Zabini and Weasley was the overwhelming number of bite marks— _human_ bite marks—that littered every crevice and space large enough to fit one's mouth into.

Zabini's penis and testicles seemed to have been especially targeted by the most vicious of the masticators. Yes, masticators _plural_ , because as Severus could easily tell, even most of the neighboring sets of teeth marks had clearly been made by different voracious entities.

He wanted to hope that the bites had taken place after the boy had died, but the evidence was in disagreement with his wishes. Not only were many of the tooth indentations swollen and dark with bruising, a sure sign that they had occurred during the child's living hours, but also there was the undeniable fact that Ron Weasley's body had been similarly covered in an equally brutal manner.

Severus's sharp hearing picked up the clear pattern of Poppy's footsteps, and he turned to see her still white face appear around the edge of the guarded curtains. She walked slowly towards him, walking delicately as to not make any unnecessary sounds against the harsh dullness of gloom surrounding the torturous death of Blaise Zabini.

"Has his mother been notified yet?" Severus asked in a strained voice.

"The aurors have not yet been able to locate her. It's possible that she is just out of the house or perhaps out of town completely. They've only been looking for two hours."

Severus nodded absently. He knew that Zabini's mother had often left the boy alone for weeks at a time as she just seemed to disappear into the darkness surrounding the underbelly of the magical society. There was no telling what her reaction might be upon learning of her son's death, provided they managed to find her at all.

 _If she had known anything about this, it would be the perfect opportunity to just leave town and start over somewhere else_ , he thought, knowing the idea to be more realistic than cynical.

He crossed his arms, raising a hand up to rub against his face agitatedly.

Poppy remained silent beside him, her eyes settling on the boy who was never going to become thirteen; the boy who would never need another haircut or new shoes; the boy who would never know what it was like to have one of those infamous teenage growth spurts, fall in love, or even find something to devote the rest of his life to. This boy would never get his apparition license or experience what life was like beyond just one's school years.

_Rather, this boy knew what it was to be hideously mistreated, tortured, brutalized and then dumped like garbage, out for the world to see without hope of maintaining any last scraps of his long forgotten dignity._

"Are you going to be able to do an autopsy?" Severus asked her softly, breaking the morbid silence between the two of them.

"Typically I would need the parent's agreement, but given the unusual circumstances of this case, coupled with the guardian's subsequent disappearance, it is likely that I will have full legal rights to proceed by the end of tomorrow, if not sooner." She said wearily.

Severus nodded; his eyes unfocused as he sought to make sense out the situation.

"And the Weasley boy? What is his status?"

"Alive," Poppy said grimly, causing Severus to turn and actually look at her.

"I was under the impression that having the presence of his mother there was beginning to turn the tide," Severus said cautiously.

"It was," Poppy said tersely.

"What happened?" Severus asked softly.

"I believe that he had a very violent flashback to something previously unrecalled," she said darkly. "When he began screaming, there was something in his eyes and demeanor that suggested he was witnessing something very powerful and frightening that he had formerly been unable to mentally process. He worked himself into convulsions, until vomiting severely enough to require heavy sedation while we tried to rehydrate his body, as well as calm his central nervous system. It was almost as though his subconscious had initiated the purging in hopes of moving past the very disturbing experiences he undoubtedly been forced to go through."

Severus moved his hand over his eyes for a moment, trying to imagine the magnitude of something that disturbing, but his mind kept moving back to thoughts of Lee asking them both if Ron was going to die.

"Have you considered moving him to St. Mungo's?" He asked gently. "I am aware that he is a Hogwarts student, but it seems likely that with their larger staff and broader range of experience, we may not be able to give him all that is needed here." He said, laying a hand on her shoulder.

"Believe me, it is that thought alone that has been sitting at the forefront of my mind ever since the boy's unprecedented arrival in Minerva's classroom. _Unfortunately_ , Molly is quite right in suggesting that if we send him to St. Mungo's, then the Daily Prophet will likely begin making up their own stories about the child, as well as his father's place of employment. Besides, with our newest situation here," she glanced pointedly at the bed where Zabini's body lay, "rumors will begin to get out of control, severely undermining our ability to make decisions. And as much as I currently do not like having Dumbledore in charge, I would much prefer him than having someone _, like say Lucius Malfoy_ , in command of this school."

 _Malfoy_ , Severus thought with another gut rippling sensation. Malfoy's son was still missing, and in the light of Weasley and Zabini, the other boy's absence suddenly seemed that much more ominous.

"I need to go check in with my son," Severus said after another moment of thought.

"You may use the floo here if you would like," she said to his already retreating back.

"No, I believe I need the time to think, but thank you," he said, turning back to look solemnly into her still calm face.

…

Lee stared at the empty fireplace, wishing that Severus would go ahead and come back. He knew that Professor McGonagall was watching him, even though she was using the pretense of reading a novel to hide the action.

He could have escaped her eyes by going back into his room, but he was fairly certain that she would eventually come after him to talk about something, just to put her mind at ease about his safety.

It was easier to just sit on the floor and let her stare.

_She could be staring at Lillian._

True, Lillian was curled partially around his neck and shoulder, after claiming that it was one of the warmest spots on him. He didn't mind. It was a lot better than McGonagall's staring.

He wished that he hadn't gotten caught up with all of his homework so early. It was still more than a week until the Spring term and he was already prepared for it to start.

 _And yet, not_ , his mind whispered at him.

He had gotten permission to wear the blue spikes in his hair on the first day back to classes. Severus had said that he could even wear them for the first week back, provided that they were not a distraction to anyone else— _like Severus._

He wasn't worried about his hair, and he was getting used to the reception to his new glasses and hair. No, mostly he was wondering how his classmates would react upon finding out about his new adoption status.

He wasn't ashamed of Severus, far from it in fact, but he had a feeling that some of the others would not feel as warmly towards his new situation as say, McGonagall or Poppy had.

He wondered what had happened to Draco Malfoy. Severus had told him that Lucius didn't know his whereabouts, but Lucius wasn't exactly the model father either. He still remembered that when Lucius's kissed his son, not only had the man been naked, but there had also been tongue involved. It was one of the reoccurring images in his nightmares. In fact, anything with Lucius's tongue had wandered through his dream world at least once, if not several times more.

If there was such a thing as justice in the world, then what Hermione had done to him should at least partially count. When he thought about something like that happening to Lucius in a crowd full of witnesses, he felt a thrill go through him at the idea.

Witnesses, witnesses, something was tugging at his brain trying to make a connection.

" _JIMMY!"_ He thought as the light suddenly came on, nearly blinding his inner synapses with the intensity of the thought.

" _Hey there little dude,"_ the castle said a moment later.

" _I gotta ask you something. After Severus took Draco Malfoy to the infirmary, what happened after that?"_

" _Draco, he's the little pale boy who hurt Ron and Hermione, right?"_

" _Woah woah, that's the right person, but what did he do to Ron?"_ Lee asked, suddenly feeling his head pounding.

" _Aww dang."_ Jimmy said, annoyed at himself. " _I didn't want to be the one to tell you. I thought your friend would have told you,"_ Jimmy said remorsefully.

" _What? Please tell me. He can't tell anyone anything right now; you know better than I do, right?_ " He pleaded.

He heard Jimmy sigh; an idea he had found odd until Jimmy had pointed out that if a castle could smirk, and a castle could shrug, then a castle could sigh too.

" _That little blond haired guy, he sent them goons of his ahead with Hermione, and then he raped Ron there in the hallway and left him there bleeding. Severus found him later and saved him, but he promised him that he'd not say anything without your friend's direct permission. That's why I figured that your friend would have told you, 'cause I knew your dad wouldn't break a promise like that."_ Jimmy explained sadly.

He felt coldness seeping through his bones at the information that Ron hadn't been able to trust him with.

" _Ron saw Lucius hurt me, but he didn't think I was a good enough friend to tell about what Draco did to him?_ " He said, bowing his head and fighting the urge to cry.

" _Don't think of it like that little dude. He wouldn't have told_ anyone _. He never even told your dad who had hurt him, even though I think Severus had a pretty good idea. Ron even said something like he'd cut out his own tongue before telling anyone his attacker's identity_."

" _Aren't you a witness though, Jimmy?"_ Lee asked plaintively.

" _Aw, my opinion doesn't count for much little dude. I am an 'inanimate object,' or so the bylaws say anyways. They don't think of me as a very legit witness, since I'm not human."_

" _That has got to be one of the stupidest ideas that has ever been put out there, especially in a wizarding world,"_ he decried adamantly.

" _Hey, I didn't say that I agreed with the dolts._ " Jimmy said defensively.

" _I'm sorry. I'm just upset,"_ Lee said morosely.

" _Do you still want to know what happened to that blond haired guy after he left the infirmary?_ "

" _Sure, why not,_ " he answered glumly.

" _It was a weird thing, really,"_ Jimmy said slowly.

" _Yeah?"_

" _Your other little friend, Hermione, was walking down the hall and they started up a conversation."_

" _Hold on, Hermione voluntarily spoke to Draco Malfoy?"_ He asked, the words dragging themselves roughly along in his mind.

" _Like I said, weird things,"_ Jimmy said with another one of those odd shrugs that Lee could feel more than . . . _see_.

" _Then what?"_ He asked curiously.

" _A door opened in a wall and they went away."_

As far as explanations went, he found that one to be pretty far out there.

" _What? What do you mean?"_ Lee asked incredulously.

" _I—I don't know what I mean. This is why castles make lousy witnesses. We can't always explain what we see,"_ Jimmy said, sounding somewhat lost.

" _Was it a door in one of your walls?"_ He asked, trying to help his friend identify the problem.

" _Yes, but no?"_ Jimmy asked, sounding more and more perturbed. " _I cover a lot of ground. The original plans for my design were lost when the creator died. As far as I can tell, there has never been another person after my creator who had been down every single one of the passageways within my domain. I daren't even say '_ within my walls, _' because walls are physical, and I'm not entirely so."_ Jimmy said.

" _I take it that you don't talk to a lot of other folks about this sort of thing, right?"_ Lee asked speculatively.

" _When a headmaster binds their will to my will, then they are able to know what I know, as much as their brains will allow. I don't—I've never had to explain something like this before, because I've never had a headmaster as annoyingly disconnected as Dumbledore. In past years, if something of this nature came up, then the headmaster and I would confer, and get two different angles on the same problem. Not only does the headmaster provide another point of view, but since the headmaster is human, more or less, it allows us to look at the problem with two different ways of processing and analyzing data,"_ Jimmy reasoned out to Lee.

" _Why do you make it sound like the human brain and your brain are so very different? I thought you said you were created by humans, right?"_ He asked Jimmy, not really understanding.

" _Well, let me try to describe it another way then,"_ Jimmy said thoughtfully. " _Basically, humans and magically created inanimate objects, such as me and your little Snitch friend, are from two different cultures. We don't necessarily consider the same things valuable; we don't understand the here and now, or the concepts of time and space, in the same ways. My concept of now is far more vast than yours, little dude."_

" _I suppose that it's kind of like the differences between me and the Dursleys, right?"_ He asked carefully.

" _Something like that,"_ Jimmy said in amusement. " _But if you're trying to imply that I'm anything like the Dursleys—,"_ Jimmy said, cutting off the thought at Lee's wild protesting.

" _You better find something to do. Your dad's coming down the hall real slow like. He looks sad,_ " Jimmy said somberly.

" _And upset?"_ He asked worriedly.

" _Some, but mostly just really sad and unhappy; it's probably got something to do with what Hagrid found earlier this morning."_

" _What'd he find?"_ Lee asked interestedly.

" _Nope, sorry little dude. I'm under strict orders from your dad not to tell you anything about this one, at least until he thinks you should know; in which case, he'll likely tell you himself._ " Jimmy said emphatically.

" _I guess I can respect that,_ " Lee said slowly.

" _I really don't think you want to know about this one. Here, let me get your little Snitch's attention."_

Lee looked up and saw the beautifully constructed Snitch bouncing in the air near him, almost shyly, it seemed.

"Oh, so you do listen to _someone,_ huh little guy?" Lee softly asked the brightly flashing ball, as it carefully wound its way around the boy's head.

It twirled in a pirouette, as though really answering his question.

He reached out his hand to touch it and it bobbed down lower, uncertainly.

"I promise I won't hurt you," Lee said solemnly to the cautious little toy.

Finally it spun itself twice around his shoulders before alighting in Lee's outstretched hand.

"Let's go home," he said in a clear voice to the softly lit ball.

Instantly the little wings started fluttering once more as Lee got to his feet and headed to his room. The little Snitch floated just beside him the entire way, keeping the boy in its sight.

…

From his shoulder, Lillian watched the progression of the hallway until they came to a stop in the boy's room. Then she lay down once more as she realized that the boy was getting ready to take a nap. She watched him close the door and do something to turn off the lights.

As the visual world disappeared completely, she noticed that the little flashing creature that the castle had referred to as a "Snitch" was still moving around the room. As it passed by the cold walls around the exterior of the space, it trailed an almost snakelike aura of light behind it in a most enchanting way.

Soon however, her young master was asleep. He did not even wake when his first-companion-then-parent came into the room a short while after. She watched the man stand and gaze at the boy in silence, before coming over to gently touch his lips to the boy's head.

She could not understand his speech like she could with the boy, but she knew without a doubt that he loved the boy more than words could explain anyway.


	38. Head Check

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is one of my favorite chapters.

After hearing Severus speak about the number of missing boys in Slytherin that year, Poppy decided to take the initiative and put together a meeting between herself and the four Hogwarts house heads. Severus and Minerva had agreed to leave Dumbledore out of it, meaning that they had needed a meeting place, preferably a neutral one. It had been for that reason alone that she had offered to hold the meeting in her office.

"Sorry it's a bit cramped, but this was too important to let go while we searched for a better place," Poppy said apologetically, after passing out mugs of hot tea to each of the four professors.

She had thoughtfully provided a stool for Filius, knowing how he hated sitting under everyone, as he often had told her in other meetings. Being of rather short stature herself, she understood the feeling to a degree.

"I know you wouldn't have called us all together like this unless it was an emergency," Pomona said with a sigh.

"And Albus?" Filius asked in an unusually tremulous voice.

Poppy saw Minerva and Severus glance at each other, but she decided to answer his question before letting them get into a mess.

"I have certain reason to believe that Albus is either involved or is merely aware of what's happening and is simply not doing anything about it," she said gravely.

"And what is this _it_ that you are referring to, Poppy?" Pomona asked bluntly.

"Are all of you aware of the disappearance of two second year boys that occurred more than two weeks before Christmas?" Poppy put the question to all of them although she only needed to hear from Sprout and Flitwick.

"I wasn't sure if it had been deemed an actual disappearance yet," Filius said, peering closely at her.

"It certainly isn't anymore," Severus said harshly.

She shot him a glare but did not reprimand him for his interruption; knowing full and well that the man did not grieve well.

"What has happened?" Pomona asked; her eyes wide with trepidation.

She glanced at Severus but he irritatively waved her on.

"They are no longer missing. Ron Weasley mysteriously made his way back by floo into one of Minerva's classes in an extremely disheveled manner," she paused and raised a hand to Minerva who looked ready to interrupt. "I know that the description does not do the boy's condition justice, but I thought I would let you explain that more in depth later." Poppy looked at the woman in questioning, but Minerva merely closed her mouth and nodded her head in agreement.

"And the other boy?" Filius looked curiously at her and then surprisingly at Severus. "He is a Slytherin, is he not?"

Poppy looked at Severus, certain that there would be an explosion of some sort, but the man was resolutely staring at her desktop, his jaw clenched tightly.

"Was," came a soft voice to the man's left.

Filius and Pomona looked at Minerva in surprise at her answering for the Slytherin head of house, knowing full and well that theirs was a historically unhappy relationship.

"Unfortunately, Minerva is correct. At a little after four this morning, Hagrid came across the desiccated remains of Blaise Zabini, just outside the anti-apparition line."

Her announcement was met with gasps of disbelief from both Filius and Pomona.

"Have you yet heard from the child's mother?" Minerva asked gently in their silence.

"No," Poppy answered simply.

"The aurors have been attempting to locate her since this morning, correct?" Severus asked in a strained voice.

She looked at the man as he fought to keep control over his emotions.

"Correct," she said, looking sadly at him. "No one has seen her for more than a week, and she apparently did not tell anyone of her departure."

Severus nodded his head stiffly at her words, unsurprised at her news.

"What I need now is to know if any of you have any other unreported missing students." Poppy asked in a stern tone to the four professors sitting before her in a stony silence.

"Mine are all accounted for, but it is yet to be seen how the youngest Weasley boy will fare," Minerva said soberly.

"There are two fifth year boys who have been missing since mid-November," Filius said hesitantly a moment after Minerva finished speaking.

"Thank you for letting us know, Filius," Poppy said gravely.

They sat in uncomfortable silence until Pomona finally looked up from across the table.

"There are also two boys missing from Hufflepuff," she said slowly. "One boy is a sixth year, while the other boy is only a fourth year," she said, looking away painfully.

"Severus, will you explain the situation in Slytherin as it currently stands?" She asked the man when it seemed that he would never speak.

Severus looked up into her eyes with pain sketched clearly across his face.

"I am sorry that I must ask you to further discuss this, but even I don't know the full details," she said apologetically.

He sighed and then sat up with new resolve.

"Until early this morning, there were six boys missing from Slytherin," he said, ignoring the loud gasp opposite the table from him. "Now there are five missing boys and one murdered child," he said coldly. "Of the five boys that are still missing, one is a second year, two are fifth years, and the other two are sixth years."

"Have you informed their parents?" Pomona asked with an accusatory edge in her voice.

"The second year's parent is relieved to be rid of him," he said, turning in his chair to sneer at her cruelly. "Of the other four, two of their sets of parents are very worried and I have been in near constant contact since October, when the boys apparently disappeared together. As for the remaining two boys, each has at least one parent in Azkaban and largely claims Hogwarts as their only home."

He stared furiously at the woman until she looked away in discomfort.

"So yes, I _have_ informed their parents, as much as is possible," he stated bitterly, finally turning back to reaffix his eyes onto the tabletop, crossing his arms tightly as he did so.

"Severus, thank you for helping us all to better understand," Poppy said respectfully.

And so it went.

Minerva gave details onto the Weasley boy's incredible entrance into her classroom, and relayed them the boy's statement preceding Hermione Granger's unconscious slump.

"Has he said anything since being admitted to the infirmary?" Filius asked.

_You mean, other than "Fuck you"?_

"No," she said, not caring to mention Molly Weasley's presence without her permission. Poppy had nothing on Molly in full wrath mode, and she knew it.

They all agreed that for the next upcoming term, there would be a new advisement that students should only proceed across the castle grounds in groups of three or more, since all of those who had disappeared had done so by ones or twos.

After adjourning, Poppy turned to Severus and asked, perhaps in a louder voice than necessary, whether or not he was going to inform the other professors about Lee before the beginning of term. He looked at her with annoyance before the inevitable occurred.

"Severus, who is Lee? Is that a student here?" Pomona asked with undisguised curiosity.

"Just think Severus, this way the boy doesn't have to explain to all of his teachers during the first week back," Poppy said sweetly, skillfully ignoring the glower he was focusing pointedly towards her.

When Severus turned to look at the other professors, Poppy was relieved to see that the dark expression had lightened somewhat.

"Lee is my son," Severus said shortly. Unsurprisingly, the Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff heads gasped together once more.

"I wasn't aware—," Pomona started out apologetically, but Severus waved her explanation away agitatedly.

"I adopted the lad over the Christmas holidays," Severus explained.

Poppy looked at him imploringly until the man finally acceded with a long suffering sigh.

"Upon being adopted, he asked me shortly thereafter if he could change his name—his entire name, as it turned out. We discussed his reasons for it and I agreed. His surname is now the same as mine, and he chose his own first and middle names."

"What was his name before the adoption?" Filius asked, tilting his head to gaze into Severus's face.

Severus looked at Poppy, a clear ' _do I have to do this?'_ message on his face. Resisting the urge to smile at the discomfited man, she nodded her head.

"Prior to being adopted, the lad went by 'Harry Potter.'"

…

Severus knew that their shocked silence wouldn't last long, and he wasn't wrong.

They both exclaimed simultaneously at him, arguing that he had no right, that he had no experience with raising a child— _that one he silently agreed with,_ but mostly their statements focused on why he felt it necessary to take him out of the home he had been in the majority of his life.

That one they—he and Poppy—could tackle easily; it was just a question of whether they _should_. How much did the others really need to know? If it were up to him, he would rather they know nothing about his son's former life, however, he knew that wouldn't be enough.

"It was necessary to remove him from his home for his own protection," Poppy interjected into the conversation.

"Surely Albus would have done that himself if he had felt there was a need!" Pomona argued vehemently.

"And that is exactly why I do not trust him anymore," Severus said with an icy edge to his voice. "He knew that the situation was not how it should have been, but he only stood by and did nothing, while my son suffered the consequences!" He barked angrily at them. "He has the mental _and_ physical scars to prove it too!" He growled, trying to rein himself back in.

They were staring at him wide eyed in shock from his outburst.

 _And this is why I did not plan to tell them anything_ , he thought vindictively.

"Severus," Filius said slowly, "are you aware that you just referred to him as your 'son'?"

"He is," Poppy said in his silence.

"Lee only trusts Severus," Minerva said, looking at Poppy as she spoke the other woman's words back at her.

"I'm sorry, I cannot help but thinking of the two of you from last year. What changed?" Pomona asked him quietly.

"I promised to protect him, and thus far in his life, I'm the only one who has ever come through on such an assurance," Severus said heavily, his anger slowly being usurped by the image of his son pleading with him not to ever leave him.

"He is my child and I am his father, and I mean to do right by him. Now if you will excuse me, it is his bedtime, and I must go tuck him in," he said, quickly stalking out the office, knowing yet again what their responses were likely to be.

…

Lee sat on his bed in his pajamas waiting for his father to come back from the meeting. Jimmy had been talking to him for most of the evening about different ways of looking at things, but he had stopped when he had noticed Severus walking down a hallway near their quarters.

"How's he look now?" Lee asked out loud into the empty space.

" _The closer he gets here, the more he smiles."_ Jimmy said happily.

Lee laughed out loud at the image.

"I wonder what happens when a student sees him," he said with a giggle.

" _Oh that's the best part. He just keeps smiling, and then they run_ ," Jimmy said with a scornful laugh of his own.

Lee was still giggling at the idea when he heard the door open and the sound of Severus's footsteps walk in.

" _Here he comes, night Lee,"_ Jimmy whispered.

Then Severus walked into his room just as Jimmy had promised he would.

"Hi," Lee said with a grin.

Severus grinned a soft smile back at him, before making his way over to the bed and sitting down next to him.

Lee wrapped his arms around him in a tight hug, glad to see him come back as always. He smiled to himself as Severus hesitated for a split second—like always—before returning the hug, giving as good as he got.

When they finally disengaged, Severus kept his arm around the boy, and Lee continued to revel in the warmth and safeness he felt when he was around the man.

"Jimmy says you were scaring kids tonight," he said with a tiny giggle.

"That's unusual?" Severus asked back in mock surprise.

"I think you should go into all of your classes the first week back and smile the whole class period. It'd be good exercise for those muscles," he said with a wiggle of his eyebrows. "After all, even if they complained, how would that come across? I didn't like it because he smiled at me?" Lee said, bursting into a stream of giggles.

"Hmm," Severus said as though really contemplating the ridiculous concept.

Unfortunately, a yawn worked its way out of Lee's mouth then, breaking into their lighthearted banter.

"I think that's a sign," Severus said, raising his own eyebrows to emphasize the point.

"You gonna tuck me in?" Lee asked, knowing the answer, but wanting to hear it again.

"Have you brushed your teeth?"

"Uh huh," Lee said with another yawn.

"You did not need to show me. I believed you," Severus said cheekily.

He groaned and lightly slapped Severus's arm.

"So are you?" He asked, looking carefully up at Severus.

"And kiss you goodnight, as always child," Severus said looking fondly down at him.

He quickly scurried under his covers, making sure not to accidentally squish Lillian on the way. He found her down by his feet and pulled her up to nestle next to his neck, where she would be more comfortable.

"I believe that Lillian has already increased in length," Severus said, eyeing the purple and yellow snake carefully.

"But still little, right?" Lee asked him, suddenly aware that he wasn't talking about her.

"Still little," Severus said with a careful nod. "She still needs to be protected and taken care of," Severus said, specifically looking Lee in the eye as he spoke.

Lee nodded his understanding solemnly while watching his father carefully tuck in the blankets around him, in an effort to keep out the ever present chill of the dungeons while he slept. He stayed still as his father also delicately removed his glasses and placed them safely next to the bed.

Then he snuggled into the bed covers more firmly, his mind already wandering on the path that led to dreamland.

"Severus?" He asked sleepily.

"Child?" The man responded softly.

"'Member when we went and got my glasses?" He asked, barely able to keep his eyes open.

"Yes," Severus said, laying a warm hand on his head and softly stroking his fingers through the boy's hair.

As always, that took his attention away for a second while he leaned unconsciously into the touch, a blissful expression on his face.

"And you took my hand in the hallway?" He was finally able to say, as the outside world began disconnecting around them.

"Yes?" Severus asked calmly.

"That was 'cause you didn't want to lose me, right?" He asked distantly, his eyes no longer fighting to stay open.

"Correct. You are far too precious to me to be lost," Severus said, leaning over and softly kissing the boy's head.

Lee smiled at his words just as sleep finally overtook his body.

Severus stayed by the bedside until he was sure that the boy was indeed asleep, and it was only then that he stood and walked back out into the hallway, shutting the door softly as he went.


	39. The Power of the Mind

The rest of the holidays practically flew by after that.

Severus began teaching the boy simple shielding spells, learning along the way that the boy's own training in defense was far below adequate for his age and needs.

There were certainly plenty of places to practice in within the dungeons themselves; many of the rooms being far too inadequate to teach classes in, but they were fine for blowing things up. Severus noted that the child caught on quickly, making him wonder more and more about the boy's difficulties in his own class.

Finally, there came a day when the spell that he was trying to teach the boy simply would not work for the child. Severus had thought that the boy would take to the spell just as easily as he had done the others, but he had not, and now after nearly two hours of frustrating failures, it was time to reevaluate. Severus signaled that they should sit and take a well-deserved break, which would hopefully allow him the chance to figure out what was going wrong.

He realized that he might have been overly confident about Lee's skill level; overconfidence likely buoyed on from the steady stream of successes that they'd had in their defense levels up until this point.

The concept of the spell was simple enough. The practice was not. The spell was " _Pencon tenar."_

The spell was mostly nonverbal _, which might have been the problem_ , Severus thought. The words did not have to be spoken silently, but it was a more effective approach to take if possible. Roughly translated, the spell required the defender to "hold with the mind," or in more simple terms, to create a "mind hold."

After the spell was activated, then all it required was to create the mental image that you wanted to have happen to them. The hold would then last for about three seconds, not a great deal of time, but enough to do some serious damage to the person in question. Severus had seen some users of the spell actually pick their opponents off the ground and hold them there, while others tended to just "hold and shoot," to borrow a muggle photography concept.

The possibilities were practically endless, provided one's will was strong enough to create whatever mental image that had been selected.

There was only one downside to the spell, which also could be considered an upside as well: lethal spells were null against someone in this state; meaning that those at the professional level often eschewed the use of it, but why it was especially good for someone at a student level of practice.

From out of the corner of his eye, he had watched while Lee had gotten water and then wearily taken a seat on the dusty stone floor. The boy was now staring resolutely at the floor, his brow wrinkled in thought, as he too sought to unwind the problem mentally.

Abruptly the lad's face smoothed and he looked up at Severus with a grin.

"Let's do it again," he said with an excited glint in his eye.

Severus raised an eyebrow at him, but stood up without a word and headed back to their practice space in the middle of the room.

Less than thirty seconds later he was caught by the child with _Rictumsempra_ , causing him to double up with pain. The boy, who had been standing halfway across the room from him, was now standing beside him with a devilish grin, waiting for Severus's pain to ease so that they could talk.

"Okay brat, what did you do differently?" Severus asked after a moment.

"Switched hands," the child said proudly.

"Wand hands?"

The boy nodded earnestly.

"Let's prove the rest of your theory then," he said with a sigh. "Switch back and see if you're still successful."

That time, the boy took him out physically. Severus abruptly looked up to realize that there was a knee planted on his sternum and a wand at his head.

He sat up easily enough—the boy's weight was still rather insignificant, even though he had finally begun gaining—but when Severus tried to stand, he realized that the child must have kicked a foot into his right knee, because it gave out when he attempted to put weight on it.

A second later the boy was at his side, trying to steady him with a worried, apologetic look on his face.

"Are you—?" the boy started to ask before Severus cut him off with a wave of the hand.

Severus stood up again, resting all of his weight on his left side, before gingerly trying out the right once more. It held that time, but only barely, leading to his decision that they stop for the day.

He quickly transfigured a couple of broken boards into a set of crutches and they set off for their quarters, the boy walking beside him with an anxious face that he kept peering up at him with.

Once back in their main living area, Severus called for Jayda to bring him some wrapped ice, which he charmed not to melt, before finally going to his room to rest.

"Should I get Poppy?" The boy asked hesitantly from the doorway after patiently waiting for Severus to get settled on the side of the bed closest to the doorway.

"If it gets any worse, we shall do just that, but in the meantime, I believe that this will be fine," he said, trying not to wince in front of the child.

"I'm sorry," the boy said, looking almost as miserable as Severus's knee felt.

"Child, come here," Severus said, waving the lad closer.

Lee took two hesitant steps into the room before stopping and biting his lip, not looking Severus in the eyes.

Severus internally groaned as he realized that this was likely yet another leftover side effect of the boy's upbringing by those idiotic, malcontent Dursleys.

"Lee," Severus said sternly, waiting until the boy looked up at him, his eyes wide in trepidation.

Severus pointed at the empty side of the bed to his left, and looked up at the boy intently.

Finally the child began to move in short, jerky little steps, until he had reached the far side of the bed and sat gingerly on the edge, barely making an indentation in the covers. He only had half of his body touching the bed and virtually none of his insubstantial weight, Severus noted with some annoyance.

"Child, I am not angry with you," he said gently, reaching out his hand to the boy.

He watched as Lee slowly reached up his hand to lightly touch the man's larger one, trying to fight his fears with what he knew of their recent history.

Finally the boy latched on to the man's hand and scooted in slightly closer to him, letting out a frightened breath as he did so. Severus continued to sit quietly, not making any movements that might startle the child.

Still holding his hand, the child moved around so that he was sitting cross legged and at an angle to Severus, his head bowed shamefully.

"Lee, I am very proud of what you did today," Severus said firmly.

"What, for hurting you?" The boy asked mournfully, raising his head for an instant before dropping it back down again. In that moment, Severus had seen the tears gathering heavily in the lad's vibrant green eyes.

"Child, defense training often _is_ painful. As I warned you early on, it's one of the risks that come with the training. Overall, I'd much rather be hurt short-term than be maimed or killed long-term," he said gently, yet emphatically.

His son sniffled and then looked up at him sorrowfully; tear tracks visible on his cheeks.

"I don't want you to be killed," he said, lip trembling slightly.

"Nor do I," he said seriously, pulling a little on the boy's hand to try to bring him closer.

The child held back for another moment before slowly allowing himself to be pulled in next to Severus's larger body. Severus gently draped an arm around the tearful trembling boy, embracing him protectively.

"But however much I might worry for my own safety, I only worry that much more for yours," he said quietly, speaking directly his son's ear.

The child gasped out a sob at his words, turning his face against Severus's chest as the sobbing only became more pronounced. Severus took the opportunity to hold the boy that much closer, as the child did the same; reaching out to clutch at him tightly.

When his son's tears had finally reached their climax and the boy's body was finally relaxing somewhat against him, Severus spoke to him again, but in a significantly less serious tone.

"Hmm, it seems that my SLOB has come by for a visit," he said in mock surprise.

Lee groaned against his chest, but did not look up at him, choosing to poke him lightly in the ribs instead.

"Ow?"

His child looked up then, his eyes red behind his never smudged glasses, and stuck his tongue out defiantly at him.

"That didn't hurt," he said, narrowing his eyes to look at Severus strictly.

"How do you know?" Severus inquired incredulously.

"Because my dad's tougher than that," the boy said confidently, before dropping his head back down lightly against Severus's chest once more.


	40. Nightmare

Severus lay in bed thinking of the things that he still needed to do before the start of the next term that upcoming Monday. Somehow it was already Saturday night— _probably Sunday morning by now_ —and the term beginning was nearly sitting in their laps.

He had already spoken with Minerva earlier that day regarding the boy's return to the Gryffindor tower. They had tentatively written down early February as a possible move date, provided that Lee's nightmares continued to diminish in number and intensity as they had been during the break. He had been surprised to realize that he didn't want the boy to go, that he had gotten used to being around the child and would likely miss his constant presence if his son were no longer living across the hall from him.

But he hadn't told Minerva any of this, choosing to keep at least _some_ of his business private for once. It was likely that Poppy would know instantly if he spoke to her about it, but with the Weasley boy's recent setbacks, and the Zabini child's upcoming autopsy, all in addition to the upcoming new term, she had been busier than ever, with barely a moment to spare for anyone.

And then there was the question of the child himself. What did Lee want?

He understood that part of being at Hogwarts was spending time away from home, but his son's situation was not typical in any sense of the word. The way he saw it, the lad had spent most of his life away from home already; so why add to that sense of separateness if the boy was still uncertain about going back?

Moreover, Severus didn't know if the uncertainty was coming largely from Lee or from himself.

 _Or possibly both,_ his mind pointed out, less than helpfully.

These were the thoughts that whirled around him as he finally slipped into a deep, if not exactly restful, sleep.

…

When he opened his eyes a few hours later, he did so with the muddled mind of a man who has just been abruptly awakened.

It was not time to get up yet; _that_ he could tell without checking the time. No, he must have heard someth—wait there it was again.

His mind slipped into gear as he realized what he had heard.

 _Lee_.

His son was shouting something in his sleep. As he stood up carefully, his knee not quite better even though it had been a few days since the injury, his sharp hearing picked up on some of the words his child was shrieking into the dark.

"NO! Please don't— _[something unintelligible]—,"_ he heard indistinctly, as he quickly strode across the hall to his son's bedside.

The boy was pressed hard against the far wall, enough to create an indentation with his body against its charmed softness. The child's Snitch was playing the part of a concerned nightlight, bobbing anxiously all around his distressed form. Severus looked for his snake, Lillian, and found her slithering back and forth on the mattress next to him. She looked accusingly at him as though he should have been doing something before that moment.

Fighting the urge to argue back with his child's pet snake, he sat down on the edge of the bed gently and tried to ascertain the current danger level of the boy's nightmare— _for them both_ , his mind reminded him. While the lad's nightmares _had_ been fewer in number over those past few weeks, they still had been enough to keep him alert as he tried to wake the child up without forcing repercussions upon them both.

He still had the bruise across his forearm from the previous week when the innate protective magic of the boy's sleep had flung him backwards into the edge of the door. If he had landed at a slightly different angle, it would have likely broken his arm, but as it was, it had not. He had been using his own high concentrate version of bruise salve on it since then, and although it no longer hurt, it was still clearly visible.

"DON'T!" The boy shrieked next to him, pushing with his legs against the mattress in a futile effort to get away from whatever demon was plaguing him that night. The child's arms and hands were crossed against one another in an attempt to protect his head and torso against the invisible assailant.

Looking at the terrified child in front of him, he felt a wave of fury wash through him as he thought of the entities involved in the creation of such a violent form of fear. He was still carefully edging his way closer to the boy's rigid form, knowing all too well that sudden movements on his own part only increased the likelihood of surprising the child, and therefore possibly hurting them both in the process.

 _Mostly me_ , he thought ruefully.

"Please don't touch me," the boy whimpered piteously, just as he was only a hand's width away from the child. He knew that his son was not speaking to him, although it angered him to think of what sorts of abuses and injustices the lad had endured before he had gotten involved.

"It hurts," the boy said heart wrenchingly, "Please don't," he begged, silent tears beginning to make their way down softly flushed cheeks.

"Daddy's here," Severus said gently, as he tried to verbally break through into the boy's unconscious.

"It hurts!" The boy cried out in his sleep, batting his arms wildly.

"Hush sweet boy," Severus spoke softly as he tentatively reached his arms out for the thrashing child. "Your Daddy Severus is here now. He won't let anyone hurt you ever again."

He continued speaking soft reassurances to the child even as he reached his arms carefully around his son and slowly pulled him to his chest. Severus was relieved that the lad's magic had not swung out at him for once; it was only the second time that he had not been hurt in the process.

Lee's head was now resting against his shoulder as his sobs continued ferociously within the confines of Severus's arms. Severus rocked their bodies back and forth as he began softly rubbing the boy's tense muscles with one hand, as the other cradled the child's head protectively.

"Shh, little one, I'm here now. Your daddy's here now and you're safe. You're safe," he whispered emotionally to the small black haired child wrapped tightly in his arms.

A moment later, he thought he felt a shift from the lad and then he heard a different questioning sound from his small bundle.

"Daddy?" The boy asked tentatively in a tiny fearful voice.

"Yes Lee," he said, greatly relieved to have the lad out of the nightmare. "Daddy's here. He won't let anyone hurt you anymore," he promised defiantly to the small head on his shoulder.

He was rewarded when Lee's smaller arms stretched out and hugged him back tightly, holding on to him in a silent, desperate plea.

"It was Lucius," the boy said, his throat catching on the bastard's name.

The thoughts that flashed through Severus's mind at the mention of that name were virulent and vicious.

"When he hurt you," the man stated darkly, knowing the answer.

His son nodded silently, tears still wetting Severus's shirt, as the lad sought a way to express his feelings at what the bastard had done to him.

"I am here now, Lee. I shall not let you be hurt by him again, and if he ever tries again, the bastard will severely regret it," he promised vehemently, his eyes burning brightly in the dim room.

 _In fact, he may soon regret his previous actions no matter what,_ he thought coldly.

He went on reassuring the child of his presence and the boy's subsequent safety with him. As he spoke, he realized that there was a small hand fisted in the front of his pajama shirt, seemingly holding on for dear life, even as the rest of the lad's body began relaxing.

"Would you feel safer if we went and lay down in my big bed?" He asked gently, as the boy continued to unwind from his nightmare.

"Uh huh," the boy said in a small voice, nodding swiftly against his chest.

"Then we shall," Severus readily agreed, cautiously standing on the sore knee. It held, but it twinged a bit uncomfortably as he stood with the added weight of the boy in his arms. As a result, he took the walk back to his own bed slowly.

As they lay down, Severus was forced to readjust the boy in order to find a more comfortable position for them both, before finally pulling the covers back up warmly around their bodies.

His small lump of boy had returned, but he did not mention it to the child. He bent over and kissed the child's soft hair instead. Lee let out a shuddery breath against him as their combined body heat quickly warmed the surrounding blankets, further calming them both.

"Are you feeling better now, child?" He asked the lad softly after a few minutes had passed.

"Some," the boy said softly, his tears having finally stopped.

"It is undoubtedly difficult at first, but it will be easier to face as you grow older," Severus said, more knowledgeable about the subject than he would have cared to admit.

"Daddy?" His son asked in a tremulous voice.

"Yes sweet child?"

"When," the boy swallowed against him, "when Lucius," he paused, rubbing his face against Severus's soft cotton shirt agitatedly, "when Lucius did what he did to you, did it hurt?" The boy asked in an extremely faint voice.

Severus was silent for a moment, pondering what and how much he should say to the lad.

"Very much so," the man finally answered in a somewhat strained voice.

"Did he make you feel bad about it?" the child haltingly inquired in a very soft voice.

Severus thought back to that poisonous memory cautiously. He remembered how the other man had taunted him when he had become hard under Lucius's cruel tongue. He remembered Lucius's comments the next day about how tired he seemed after a full night with him. He also remembered his shame as Lucius pushed into him, how he had laughed when Severus had unsuccessfully tried to fight him off.

"Yes," Severus answered, suddenly feeling very choked as the long buried emotions began swirling around his gut once more.

"He made me very ashamed of what had happened," Severus said quietly.

Silence, then the boy shifted a bit within his arms.

"Me too," his son admitted in an equally soft tone.

Severus took a deep breath, lifting the boy's smaller body up as his lungs expanded, before letting it out slowly and contemplatively.

"Are you still ashamed?" He asked the boy in a slightly stronger voice.

"Are you?" the lad inquired of him.

"The feeling comes and goes, but mostly it is overshadowed by anger. As of late however, the anger I feel is no longer just a singular experience, but rather a joint effort on both of our parts," he said in a somber voice.

When his child did not immediately answer, he continued on.

"But it is not something I let myself dwell on at all times of the day. If I were to, the feelings I had against the man would slowly consume me, until there was nothing left of my soul except for the desire to have my revenge. And even if I finally had that revenge, it still would not matter, because my life would have already been ruined." He said thoughtfully.

"Do people ever get their revenge?" The child asked imploringly. Even though the room was almost completely dark—Lee's Snitch was wandering the hallway now—he still could see the shine of the boy's eyes as they peered widely up at him.

"I once knew a man who had become obsessed with revenge, and vowed never to rest again until he had been given what he felt he deserved from life," Severus said slowly.

"What happened to him?" The boy asked him in a hushed voice.

"He was defeated by something he had never before considered important."

"What was that?" The lad asked uncertainly.

"The love that your mother had for you; she refused to let you be murdered by him, sacrificing her own life in the place of yours. And that alone was what undid him." Severus explained solemnly.

"An obsession about taking revenge on someone is a dangerous thing. It takes over your sense of what and who you really are, until you are nothing more than a corporeal—that is, flesh and blood—ghost, living among the living, yet unable to see them because your hatred is so all-encompassing."

He fell silent as his regrets fought for attention within him.

"What if you just hate yourself?" His son asked miserably.

"Then that's something that we will work on, just the two of us," Severus said gently, kissing the soft head tenderly once more.

The boy trembled as the last vestiges of built up tension fought for their release within his tired muscles.

"Self-hatred is no better than giving in to the urge for revenge. It will only taint everything you do with its reckless regard for your life," Severus softly warned, stroking the lad's hair gently.

The child yawned and Severus silently agreed, as they began drifting back down towards sleep once more.


	41. My Name is Lee

Lee sat at the Gryffindor table early that Monday morning, waiting on _someone_ to show up— _hell, anyone would be just dandy right now,_ he thought semi-anxiously.

 _Not desperately; I am not sitting here desperately waiting for someone to come in and—_ his thoughts were cut off as Neville and the other second year Gryffindor boys started making their way to the table.

"Hey, you're alive!" Dean called out brightly, heartily clapping him on the shoulder.

"Mostly," he said with a small, but honest, smile.

Neville plunked down next to him, as ungracefully as ever, a nervous smile on his face as he looked over at Lee.

"Neville, I just wanted to say h-how really sorry I am that—," Lee started out immediately, trying to apologize for causing his friend yet _another_ concussion when the boy had only tried to help.

However, the other boy only cut him off with a hasty shake of his head, before stretching out his hand as a peace offering.

Lee took his hand with a grin.

"Aww, they're so cute!" Seamus said loudly, breaking up the seriousness of their table.

"Shut it you," Lee said with a playful snarl.

"So Harry, where ya been? We thought that you might have died or gotten transferred to Hufflepuff or something!" Seamus said, punching Lee's arm a little harder than he thought had been necessary.

Lee opened his mouth to try to explain about the name thing, but just then Ginny sat down to Neville, startling them both.

"Hi Harry," she said shyly, before turning to look more confidently at Neville.

"My name's not Harry anymore," he heard himself say, feeling as though an unknown ventriloquist were actually the one speaking through him.

Unsurprisingly, Neville was the first to turn towards him, his eyebrows crooked oddly as he tried to understand what the other boy had just said.

"My name's not Harry Potter anymore," he said, speaking a little louder.

He noted with a little more anxiety that their entire side of the table had turned silent with that repeated announcement.

"Why do you say that?" Dean asked, looking at him curiously.

"I got adopted," he said shyly, but proudly. He knew that they wouldn't likely respond well to his announcement—especially when they found out by whom—but he needed them to know all the same.

"Over Christmas?" Ginny asked.

He nodded, not sure if he could handle trying to speak again.

"That's great!" She said warmly, smiling at him once more. This time, he was the shy one as he smiled back at her.

"So what's your name then?" Seamus asked, his eyes narrowing warily towards Lee.

"Lee," he said simply, not quite daring to yet say the rest of it. "My name is Lee."

"That's pretty nifty that you got to pick your own name," Neville said cheerfully.

"Maybe it got changed for him," Seamus said, sounding oddly territorial.

"No," he said as he shook his head, "I picked it. My mum's first two initials before she got married were 'L.E.'"

"That's really sweet Ha-I mean Lee," Ginny said with an indulgent smile.

And then the spell was broken for a time while the group worked on their breakfasts. Lee kept seeing Seamus peering strangely at him though, the entire time. He ignored the looks and focused on Neville and Ginny, while wondering quietly where Hermione was.

"Have you seen Hermione around anywhere?" He asked finally, as they prepared to go to their first potions class of the term.

"She said that she wasn't hungry," Parvati said as she passed by their table, already heading to class.

And then, the inevitable finally occurred. As he and Neville were making their way down the stairwell that had become rather familiar for Lee by that point, he heard Seamus shout for them to wait for him and Dean to catch up.

Neville shot a slightly exasperated look at Lee as they slowed their pace for the other two boys. Lee knew that Neville liked the two boys pretty well, but Seamus was sometimes more annoying than the effort it took to put up with him.

"Come on," Lee said in annoyance as they finally got within speaking distance of each other. "You know we can't be late for Potions," he said, glancing at Neville's pale face as he said the dreaded word.

Neville didn't know that he was soon going to be getting a new partner that term. Earlier that morning, Lee had spoken with his father seriously about possibly pairing him up with Neville occasionally in the coming months. His father had been surprised, but he knew that the boy was not one to rashly suggest concepts to him unless he had thought them through at some level of seriousness.

They made their way quickly down the stairs and then the darker corridor that led them to their potion's classroom. When they were only about fifteen meters away, Seamus poked him in the shoulder—hard—and asked him why Lee hadn't mentioned what his last name was.

"Reason being, if you changed your first name, it was probably because you changed your last name too, yeah?" Seamus asked inquisitively.

Lee sighed quietly to himself and prepared himself for the sure to be explosion.

"It's Snape," he said, turning and looking forcefully into the other boy's shocked eyes.

"You mean, P-Professor Snape?" Neville stammered wide eyed at him.

"Yup," Lee said with a higher level of cheerfulness than was needed, as he continued on into the classroom. He sat down in his usual seat, not wanting to let on about the Neville partnership that he and his father had discussed.

He found himself actively missing Ron's presence as he looked sadly at the boy's empty chair. On his other side, Hermione was already sitting there, but was slumped over, her head on her arms, looking very much as though she were taking a nap. Lee looked at her in confusion, having never before seen her act such a way in a classroom.

Neville had followed him into the classroom only a moment after and was already back in his typical seat, as far away from the front as humanly possible and still be considered within the classroom itself.

Seamus and Dean trailed in afterwards, with Seamus very purposely _not_ looking at him.

Luckily, he didn't have much time to think on that before his father was sweeping into the room with his usual dramatic flair. Lee looked over at Hermione quickly and saw with no small modicum of relief that she was sitting upright now; although, upon closer inspection, she still did not appear to actually be awake, even if her eyes _were_ mostly open.

Before his father took roll, the man glanced at him furtively, and just as secretively, Lee nodded slightly in response; his way of showing readiness for the next upcoming trial of names.

When Malfoy's name was called without a response, none of the class said anything, given that it was old hat by then. When "Potter" was _not_ called, only to be shortly followed up with by "Snape" a little while later, the response was tumultuous, particularly from the Slytherin side of the room. The only second year students from Gryffindor who didn't know about his adoption status were Hermione, Lavender and Parvati, and the only ones who made any sound were Lavender and Parvati.

Hermione, for her part, merely planted her head on her hands and stared in boredom down at the floor.

" _SILENCE_ ," Professor Snape said distinctly over the noise, staring murderously at them all, but skipping over Lee in the angry stroll of his gaze through the classroom.

"I would not say this at all, but since you dunderheads can't even make it through a roll call in peace, I shall mention it, _ONCE_ ," He said, glaring again.

"There are now _two_ individuals who go by the name of 'Snape' within this classroom; one of us is called _Professor_ Snape, and the other is _Mr._ Snape. Please try to _NOT_ get us confused. Otherwise the consequences will be very dire indeed," he said with an ominously dark look.

"Any questions? No? Good. You will be working in assigned partnerships today. Listen for your partners and then move accordingly. Brown – Bulstrode, Finnigan – Crabbe, Longbottom – Snape, Granger – Goyle, Parvati – Parkinson, Nott – Greengrass, and as for you Mr. Thomas, since we have an odd number of students now, you shall be working with Granger and Goyle."

Luckily for him, Dean's groan was not audible over the sound of the class as it moved to get reorganized.

When Lee sat down next to Neville at his favored workplace a moment later, Neville's first words to him were an apology for having been paired with him.

"Nah, I'm the lucky one. Look at poor Dean," Lee said casually, nodding his head towards the unfortunate trio on the other side of the room. As usual, Goyle's chair looked like it could have done a better job than he; while Hermione and Dean took turns scowling viciously at the other two.

"I'd rather be paired with Pansy than that group," Neville whispered conspiratorially to him.

"Ah, the dream team," Lee said with a snort towards Pansy and Parvati, who were looking very displeased with one another, before turning to his textbook to begin on the potion that Professor Snape had written on the board in front of them.

His father had carefully gone through all of the first week's Potions with him during the holidays, making him redo them until Lee was very nearly able to do them in his sleep. The one for that day was a warming potion—very helpful in frostbite cases.

As he and Neville began the arduous task of grinding and slicing ingredients, Neville leaned over and quietly asked Lee how he was doing since he had gotten adopted.

Lee decided to shock him completely by telling him the unmitigated truth.

"Dad's the absolute best."

Neville just stopped mid-cut and turned to stare at him in complete disbelief.

After a moment, he recovered enough to say that Professor Snape didn't quite strike him as much of a "Dad" type.

"That's just his reputation," Lee whispered seriously as he looked over what ingredients they were to be using first.

He sighed as he remembered that they needed to add the powdered graphorn first.

"I hate Graphorn," he said with an unpleasant look towards the hated ingredient.

"Does it make you sneeze too?" Neville asked.

"Yes," Lee said through gritted teeth, as he carefully ground out two teaspoons of the grayish, chalky stuff.

"Okay Neville, look at the list of the ingredients. What number is powdered Graphorn?"

"Um, #1, after the essence of watered seaweed," Neville said hesitantly as his eyes continued scanning the page.

"And you remember Graphorn because?"

"It makes me sneeze?" Neville asked questioningly.

"Perfect. That should work nicely," Lee said as he poured in the two teaspoons.

"What d'you mean Lee?" Neville asked him in confusion.

"Give me a sec," Lee said, his tongue between his lips in concentration, as he drew a small figure next to that ingredient, before charming it to be animated.

When he sat back from the list of ingredients, there was a charmed sneezing nose that was shown next to graphorn.

"Now say, read what it says next to the picture," Lee said with a grin.

Neville did as was instructed and then gasped inwards as the little nose filled with color as it continued sneezing.

"How did you do that?" Neville asked in amazement.

"Just a little charm my dad taught me over break. After you put in the ingredient, you read what it says next to your picture and it turns colors to indicate that you've already added it." He said proudly.

They went through a few more, with Lee drawing pictures next to the ingredients and Neville activating them verbally after they were added.

"Here's an easy one, Neville. _Lovage_ _juice_ ," he said with a soft laugh.

"Hotheadness! Make it a heart shaped head, with eyes and everything," Neville said with far more interest than Lee had ever seen out of the round faced boy during their potions class.

Lee followed his instructions and soon they were almost done. He looked at the potion and saw with some relief that liquid was a deep reddish-brown. He was stirring it counterclockwise slowly, like his dad had taught him to.

"Remember why we stir it counterclockwise?" He asked Neville as they waited for the mandatory five minutes before adding the final ingredient—one drop of snake venom.

"Snowball in reverse," Neville said with a little giggle.

"Mr. Longbottom, perhaps you could explain your reasoning on that answer," Professor Snape said from he had suddenly appeared next to them.

Lee nodded encouragingly at the other boy who had turned ghost-white at their professor's abrupt interruption.

"Um, well um, Lee said that w-w-when a snowball rolls d-downhill," Neville stopped and gulped some much needed air before continuing, "then it's only picking up ice and sn-snow, m-m-making the-the c-co-cold thicker." He said, visibly sweating in their professor's steady silence.

Lee knew that his dad was actually just waiting patiently like he did with him, but Neville needed to get through his explanation before he would ever have a chance to understand that.

"S-so if you think of a snowball r-rolling d-downhill, l-li-like you would r-read a piece of p-p-paper, then it would go left to right, in its downwards sl-slant. S-so in your m-mind, or rather m-m-my mind, it's moving clockwise. B-But since we want this t-to become warmer, or rather s-so it will warm pe-people up, then the sn-snowball goes the other way, uphill, or counter-counterclockwise," the boy said, collapsing against his chair, violently trembling and sweating fiercely.

"Ingenious concept," Professor Snape said, nodding at them both. "Five points to Gryffindor," he said, turning his back on their shocked faces.

"Has it been five minutes yet?" Neville asked a shocked instance later, turning his wide eyes on Lee.

"Uh huh," Lee said, completely flabbergasted that his father would react so generously to the boy who regularly made horrific messes in every potion's class.

"Snake fangs," the other boy said, still blinking as though trying to bring himself back to reality.

"Right, but only one, for the drop," Lee said, feeling the blood slowly coming back to his fingers and toes as he drew the last ingredient on the page.

"Got it," Neville said, adding the final drop to their potion. When correctly made, the final drop made the reddish-brown color change to a vibrant orange within the first three stirs.

"You say it, I'll stir," Lee said, suddenly nervous.

On the page, as Neville said the final words, the snake fang suddenly turned bright orange, quickly followed by their potion, as it turned the exact same color.

"Cool!" Both boys said in unison.

"As you finish your potions, remember to bottle up a vial and put all of your names on the outside," Professor said, raising an eyebrow at the awful trio to his far left, but not saying anything about the mess they had continued making.

"After you bring me a sample and clean your workplaces, you are then free to go," Professor Snape finished, with a shake of his head at the increasing level of chaos that was still occurring between Hermione, Goyle and Dean.

They quickly put together a vial of their work for the day, before taking it up together to give to Professor Snape.

"What have we here?" Professor Snape looked at their sample with interest, uncapping it to waft the smell under his sensitive nostrils.

"Mr. Longbottom, Mr. Snape, this potion is quite adequate," he said after a moment, turning back to them, "Full marks to the both of you, and please try to keep up the surprisingly good work," he swiftly said to them, before turning away to store their vial.

He didn't appear to notice that his words nearly caused Neville to pass out then and there.

Somehow Lee got him back to their work area and they finished cleaning up. Luckily, another trick that his father had taught him over the holidays was to put up the ingredients immediately after finishing with them. As a result, they only really had to clean up the cauldron, which was something Neville unfortunately had plenty of experience with. Together, they made quick work of it, and before long they were out in the hallway, staring at each other blank surprise.

Not only had Professor Snape given points to _Gryffindor_ , but he had also complimented them— _twice_. Furthermore, the two boys were also the _first_ ones done.

It took them another stairwell, and half of a hallway, before either one of them had recovered enough to speak.

"I really think I'm awake, but if I was, that wouldn't have just happened, would it?" Neville asked Lee with wide eyes.

"Apparently we're in the same dream together, because I've never gotten full marks in a Potions class either. I mean, not even when we did some stuff together over the break, just me and him." Lee said, shaking his own head in disbelief.

"He gave you marks on stuff during the holidays?" Neville asked incredulously.

"Naw," Lee clarified, "but if I screwed up, he still let me know," he said, raising his eyebrows at Neville emphatically.

"Yeah, my Gran's the same way," Neville commiserated.

"I like being adopted though," Lee said slowly, as he remembered Neville's earlier question to him. He hadn't really had time to think it through; given how much energy he had to put into keeping them both out of trouble, but now they were out of class, it was the only other thought in his head, besides their potion results.

He looked back at the other boy when he didn't saying anything in response; noticing instead that the boy was staring straight at the floor, his lip caught between his teeth and his shoulders slumped.

"Neville?" Lee asked carefully, certainly no stranger to emotional distress, especially after the past few weeks.

The boy looked up at hearing his name, but then looked at Lee as though he had never seen the other boy.

"You okay?" Lee asked, unsure of what to do.

"If I told you something, would you promise not to ever tell anyone else about it?" Neville asked in a low rough whisper.

Lee nodded solemnly.

"Come on," Neville said, uncharacteristically taking charge and leading the way.

Lee followed the other boy through the entry hall and then, as he realized that they were definitely headed outside, he pulled his shrunken cloak from his bag, enlarged it and then put it on. Neville glanced at him at he performed the counter charm, but otherwise didn't say anything.

Although the snow had stopped for once, it was still bitterly cold outside and Lee found himself staring at the other boy who braved the icy wind sans any outer garments aside from his school robes.

The other boy was clearly upset, but what about, Lee didn't know.

They finally stopped at the greenhouses and Lee gave a breath of relief at being able to get in from the outside frozen world. Neville led them through their regular class space and back towards a side that Lee had never noticed before.

 _Then again, Neville is really good at Herbology_ , he reasoned silently.

It made sense that Professor Sprout would have invited him to be more heavily involved than some of the other students.

Finally, they came to a stop behind some planting pots that were easily taller than either of them, _and possibly would have dwarfed Severus_ , he thought, mildly impressed by what sorts of magical life would fit in one the massive objects next to him.

Neville led them between a set of the pots until Lee realized that they were in a private area, cut off on all sides by the empty brownish-green monstrosities.

 _Neat,_ he thought, looking around at what appeared to be Neville's own private sanctuary.

They sat down on the ground across from one another and Lee looked closely at Neville as the boy began explaining what was on his mind.

"You know about You-Know-Who's followers right?" Neville asked him softly, even though Lee was fairly positive there wasn't another soul anywhere around them, let alone actually _in_ the greenhouse itself.

"Some," Lee admitted with a nervous nod.

"Well, back when you and me were just crawlin' around, messing ourselves up and all, that's when You-Know-Who was really scary and all, yeah?"

Lee nodded with a serious face.

"My parents," the other boy briefly seemed to choke on the word, "were both aurors, fighting against all of them. Your parents were involved too," he said softly.

"Yeah," Lee said, bowing his head, remembering many of the conversations he'd had with Severus concerning some of the very folks that Neville was mentioning.

"Only, you and me, we're like the 'casualties of war,' or something. I heard my great uncle Algie talking to my Gran about that once," the boy said stiffly.

"What happened to them?" Lee asked, his eyes widening as he began understanding.

"They were tortured," the boy whispered painfully.

Lee gasped.

"So they—?" He halfway asked, not wanting to hear the rest, not really.

"No. It's worse really. I think anyways," he said, slumping in on himself.

Lee narrowed his eyes as he tried to make sense out of what the other boy was saying to him.

"They were tortured 'til they were insane, but they didn't die," Neville said, looking up at him with death shining out of his eyes.

"Oh no," Lee whispered in horror.

"We've been visiting them since just after, but they—," Neville's face contorted painfully, "—they don't know who I am, not ever since it happened."

Lee had no idea what to say, but he remembered that Severus's hugs had always made him feel better and he wondered if it might be the same for Neville. Not quite daring to hug him though, he scooted over to him and draped an arm around the slightly bigger boy.

"I'm sorry," Lee said miserably.

Neville leaned against him a bit, sniffling lightly.

"Me too," the other boy whispered in response.


	42. Granger Gets Difficult

That afternoon, after finding out that there was still no one to cover their Defense class, Lee went back to his father's quarters—or _their quarters_ —as he was alternating back and forth between thinking of them as, in order to try and get his homework done.

He did, but considering that he had already done all of the Potions work two weeks before that, and they hadn't had a Defense class in ages; that meant that all he had to work on was Herbology.

It was a simple enough essay on Abyssinian Shrivelfig. Lee already knew that they were used in shrinking potions after being peeled, thanks to Severus's class from the previous term. There were some other higher level potions that they were also used for, but Professor Sprout had only asked for six inches. He didn't want to pull a Hermione and give her three times what she had asked for.

Although, that thought reminded him that Hermione was another source of worry for him now, thanks in part to the two classes he had just had with her that morning.

Dean had been in a roaring pissed off mood after getting to Herbology ten minutes late, thanks to the incredible mess their screwed up potion had caused a short while after Lee and Neville had left.

Meanwhile, Hermione was completely on the other end of the spectrum as she strolled in _five_ entire minutes after that. Lee had been gratified that Severus had at least given Dean a note, but since they had not arrived together, the note did nothing to help excuse Hermione's late entrance.

Nor did the girl apologize; she just plopped her stuff down, obnoxiously loud in the process, while everyone in front of Professor Sprout just quietly edged out of the way of her impressive glare. Lee thought that the girl's only saving grace had been that she still knew all the answers to anything she was asked, regardless of the fact that she had completely stopped volunteering any of her academic thoughts.

She wasn't _verbally_ offering her non-academic thoughts either, but he and Neville agreed that the looks she was giving everyone and everything were definitely of the pissed off, derisive category. That, and at one point, the girl had had the temerity to laugh at one of the Hufflepuffs who tripped over a hidden garden shear, winding up with a bloody nose when his face came in contact with the floor.

Professor Sprout, being the _head_ of house for Hufflepuff was extremely _unpleased_ with this turn of events and had taken 20 points from Gryffindor "for Ms. Granger's insensitive cheek!"

He had Neville had talked about that afterwards as they had headed back inside for lunch.

"Who would have thought that today would be the day that Professor Snape would award points to Gryffindor, while Professor Sprout would take them away from Hermione Granger of all people!" Neville had proclaimed quietly.

 _It was all very odd,_ Lee thought, now lying down on the couch after having finished his essay. He eyed the blanket lying atop the couch and pulled it down carefully as he slowly cooled off there in the slightly dank dungeon environment.

Soon his eyelids were drooping, and shortly after that, the boy was fast asleep.

…

Severus flooed Minerva McGonagall's office shortly after his last class of that day, and was relieved to see the stern faced professor sitting behind her desk.

"Have you got a moment?" He asked her through the floo's entrance.

"Severus, I—," she said, pausing and looking closer at the man. "Sure. What do you need?"

"May I step through?"

"Of course," she said, waving him over.

Severus stepped across the threshold of the floo's entrance and appeared in her office a scant instance later, absently wiping soot off of his sleeves.

She silently offered him a seat, which he took quickly, a consternated look slowly appearing over his face as he did so.

"What's wrong Severus?" Minerva asked quietly.

"Hermione Granger's comportment in my class this morning was—," he paused, trying to find a word that would not exacerbate the already difficult situation, "—disconcerting," he said finally.

"Pomona just sent me a similar report a minute ago, except she used the word 'infuriating,'" Minerva said with a frown.

They looked at one another for a moment before Minerva spoke.

"What happened?" she asked, removing her glasses and setting them quietly upon her desktop.

"She turned making a fairly simple potion into a near catastrophic situation, endangering not only herself, but her two partners as well," he said with a slight growl.

"Who were her two partners?"

"Mr. Goyle and Mr. Thomas," he said.

Minerva's forehead creased minutely in response.

"And the rest of the students?"

"Were already gone to their next class," he finished for her.

"How did it happen?" She asked carefully.

"She made an error and would not allow herself to admit it, although Mr. Thomas tried to tell her," he said, pausing for a moment. "Minerva, even Mr. _Goyle_ noticed," he added, looking her in the eyes pointedly.

He watched her attempt to hide a grimace of distaste.

"The resulting backlash was dangerous enough to force me to step in and add a neutralizing agent to stabilize it enough, just so I could _banish_ it safely," he said calmly, albeit with a raise of his eyebrows.

"Was it a worst result than Mr. Longbottom's?" She asked uncomfortably, no longer looking at him.

"He and his partner were the first ones _done_ ," he said emphatically.

She looked straight up at him, her eyes wide.

 _Time for the best part,_ his mind whispered excitedly.

"In fact, the preparation of their potion was adequate enough to warrant my awarding _them_ points," he said, steepling his hands and leaning back in anticipation of her response.

There was complete silence in the room.

"Allow me a moment to see if I've got this straight," Minerva said then, holding up a hand to him and looking away for an instant. "One of the worst Gryffindor Potions students, in the _history_ of Potions students, you decided to _give_ points to, yes?" She said, looking firmly at him.

Smirking, he nodded and added, "And his partner."

"This was later followed up by a near catastrophic mistake by Ms. Granger, one of our brightest students, correct?"

He nodded again, enjoying the flush that had begun creeping over the woman's cheeks.

"Who later went on to be 'infuriating' in Pomona's class," she said mostly to herself as she cradled her head in her hands.

More silence, before she finally looked up at him again.

"This is beginning to give me a headache," she said dully.

"I thought you might have that reaction," he said, reaching into one of the many pockets on his voluminous robes.

"Do tell me that you did _not_ orchestrate this entire mess for _my_ benefit," she said with a glare of her own as he handed her the vial.

"No, if I had 'orchestrated' this," he said, nodding in her direction, "I would have never done something quite this ridiculous," he said with a raised eyebrow.

"Damn," she said softly, tossing Professor Sprout's report across her desk as she downed the draught.

She stood up with her hands behind her back and crossed over to her window overlooking the ice covered grounds.

"Any news on Zabini's mother?" She asked, not turning around.

Severus felt his buoyant mood deflate with her question.

"No," he said tiredly.

"And the autopsy?" She asked softly, moving so that she was now perched on her desk at an angle to him.

"We haven't been able to speak about it as of yet," he said, referring to Poppy.

He watched Minerva stare at the floor tiredly for a moment before speaking.

"You will do something about Granger." He said, not really asking.

"Most _definitely_ , Severus," she said firmly, the tension in her body spiking briefly as she calmly regarded him.

Satisfied for the time being, he got up and headed for the floo, only stopping as he heard Minerva ask him one final question.

"And your son, Severus, how is he?"

"He seems to be adjusting adequately," he said somewhat ambiguously, just before tossing the floo powder to take him home.

…

He stepped out from the floo in their quarters to find his son fast asleep on the couch.

He smiled a quick grin as the peaceful form of the boy laid out underneath a blanket on the couch. He often did the same thing, _and_ _under the same blanket as well_.

Severus walked the few strides over to the couch and knelt down beside it quietly. From this angle, the boy's scar was not visible from behind his coal black hair. Likewise, the child's face was smooth and untroubled as he softly breathed in and out.

Carefully, he lifted his hand to touch his child's soft hair, stroking it gently—lovingly.

He watched a happy look come over the boy's still unconscious face, as the boy's physical self became aware of his father's presence beside him.

"Daddy?" The lad asked a few heartbeats later, his eyes blinking uncertainly in the barely lit room.

"Yes child, it is me. I am home for the day. Have you eaten anything yet?" He asked, aware that his meeting with Minerva had let him out past 6 pm.

They both listened as Lee's stomach answered for him, rumbling loudly as it did.

"Oops," the boy said shyly.

 _And sweetly –_ his mind added surprisingly.

"Neither have I; let's remedy that, shall we?" He asked, handing the child his glasses before giving the boy a lift with his hand.

They walked to the dining area with Severus lighting lamps as they went. By the time Jayda had appeared, the living space was nearly aglow with warm light.

"Jayda, would you please bring a sampling of what was served in the Great Hall for dinner tonight?" He asked her politely.

"Yes sirs! I be's doings that nows!" She chirruped with delight, popping out.

They sat down as dinner appeared in front of them.

Beside him, he noticed the boy yawning a bit as he slowly came awake.

"I hope you finished some of your homework before taking that nap," Severus said with a look towards the boy.

"Yes sir," the lad said with a nod. "I've had yours done for more than a week, and I finished all of Professor Sprout's homework earlier this afternoon."

"I hope you realize that I was telling the truth this morning. I _was_ very pleased with the results you and Mr. Longbottom came out with in your potion work today," he said.

His words were rewarded by a sudden flush across the boy's cheeks and ears.

"Thanks, Dad," the child said with an uncomfortable smile.

"How was Herbology?" Severus asked, trying to alleviate his son's discomfit with a change in topic.

He watched Lee's shoulders slump in response and could have kicked himself for his stupidity.

 _Granger_ , he thought with a quiet snarl to himself.

"It was okay, I guess." The boy answered quietly, staring at his half-full plate resolutely.

"Really," Severus said in obvious disbelief, laying his silverware down with a purposeful clank.

"Well, other-than-the-fact-that-all-the-Hufflepuffs-hate-us-now," Lee answered quickly in a headlong rush of words.

Severus looked at him questioningly.

"Who is 'us'?" He asked.

"Gryffindor," his child answered softly.

"What did you do?" He asked, fully aware that the lad had not been involved with that afternoon's events.

"It wasn't me, honest!" His son cried out, looking up at Severus with distress at the perceived slight.

"I did not say it was," Severus clarified, laying a hand on the boy's shoulder.

"Oh."

"Let me ask my question another way: Who _specifically_ was responsible for the Hufflepuff's angry reaction?"

"Hermione," his child answered dejectedly, before launching into a quickly explained account of that morning's disturbing Herbology class.

The lad looked forlornly at him afterwards.

"Daddy?" He asked in a small whisper.

"Child, what is it?" Severus asked in concern to the quick change in temperaments.

The boy pushed away from the table and came over to Severus's chair, standing beside the older man with a dejected look on his face.

"Can I sit your lap daddy?" The boy asked in a very tiny voice.

"Of course Lee," the man said, gathering him up in his arms with ease.

The lad was sitting sideways against him, his legs curled against his chest as he held onto Severus with an unusual level of neediness.

"What's wrong child?" Severus asked worriedly.

"Jimmy said that Hermione was the last to see Draco Malfoy before they disappeared through a door into a wall," his son whispered very quietly into his ear.

"Does Jimmy know what happened after?" He asked, fearful of what the boy might reveal knowledge of.

"He's never seen the door before and can't see behind it," the boy said, still whispering.

Severus contemplated that while the child wrapped an arm around his neck and put his head down upon his shoulder. In turn, he rearranged his arms so that they better supported the boy's body within the new configuration.

"I'm glad that you felt safe enough to tell me this Lee," he said softly to the small weight against him.

The boy seemed to be just content to be held for the time being, so Severus did just that, as he furtively cast a warming spell on their food for later.


	43. Snape Jr.

As the week continued on for Lee, he began to realize with some trepidation that Seamus was not the only one reacting badly to the announcement of his recent adoption status as a Snape.

It started out simply enough.

Someone—it just couldn't have been Dean, really—bumped into him when he was headed down a flight of stairs, and he had fallen, skinning his knees and one elbow in the process. He knew he had been lucky. He could have really broken something. The fact that he hadn't was why he hadn't mentioned it to Severus.

And then later in the library, Pansy Parkinson had dropped a book on his head, from up on a ladder while she was in the shelves. She had been very sorry for it, and had told him that she just hadn't wanted to climb all the way down to put the book down when she was going to need another. She swore up and down that she hadn't seen him there, and he knew that she never said sorry for _anything_ , so it made sense.

Mostly.

When he was making his way to Professor Sprout's greenhouses a couple of days later, someone lobbed a snowball at his head; _likely in fun_ , he had told himself, purposely ignoring that the snowball had been more rock and ice than actual _snow_.

Later, in one of Professor McGonagall's classes, someone had _accidentally_ transfigured a leg of his chair into a toothpick, causing him to hit the ground rather hard. Everyone had argued that things like that happened all of the time with Neville around, but Neville had babbled anxiously to him—becoming rather red in the face as well—that he hadn't been the one responsible.

He and Neville had been getting along better and better, so he had believed the boy easily enough, but that had still left him wondering about who the real culprit had been.

Likewise, while they were waiting for double potions class to begin, someone had hit him in the backside with a couple of stinging hexes that had made him jump and yip in pain at. It had forced him to keep his backside against the wall for the rest of the time, but that hadn't been too bad. It was a valuable lesson in vigilance—he tried to tell himself, his eyes watering at the pain, and not the embarrassment.

In contrast, he was fairly positive that Goyle's attempt to smack a cast iron cauldron into his head had _not_ been an accident. However, having to experience that, on _top_ of all of the accidents that week, had turned him rather jumpy; in turn causing him to trip backwards over an conveniently placed chair, earning the attention of the class and Professor Snape as well.

"Mr. Snape, is there anything wrong?" Severus had looked curiously down at where he still lay on the floor; as the boy tried to judge if it was safe to try standing once more.

He shook his head frantically, even as he heard Neville's voice urging him to tell the truth.

Unfortunately, Severus's eyes had narrowed at him; _possibly from hearing Neville's words_ , he thought miserably.

"Mr. Snape and Mr. Longbottom, I will see you two in my office _now_ ," Severus said with a darkly pressed look at them, followed by a glower at the rest of the class.

"And if I hear anything from _any_ of the rest of you," he said with sneer, "you will find the rest of your term here to be very unpleasant _indeed_ , understand?"

They all nodded.

Lee tried to stand up, but Seamus had kicked him rather painfully in the kneecap as he had fallen, and it wasn't working quite right. Thankfully, when Neville had come by, he had offered him his hand, which Lee had taken gratefully. As he stood and made his way across the rest of the room, he tried not to make his pain too obvious to the rest of them.

 _If they sense weakness, they'll tear me from limb to limb_ , he thought hysterically.

After his father had shut the door behind the two boys, he had turned to them, clearly displeased about something.

"Someone had better explain why I just left a mixed class of Gryffindors and Slytherins in my classroom unsupervised," he very nearly growled at them.

"It's nothing! Honest, I just tripped!" He tried to explain before the situation got too far out of hand.

"Mr. Longbottom?" His father had turned an upturned eyebrow towards the other boy.

"Goyle nearly brained him with a cauldron and he tripped 'cause Seamus has it out for him," Neville said, turning an upset face on Lee's now scowling countenance.

"It was only an accident," Lee protested with a snarl almost as good as one of Severus's own.

"Like it was an accident when Dean pushed you down two flights of stairs earlier this week?" Neville said, whirling on the other boy; angry at his friend for just taking the abuse and not fighting back in any way, even if it meant telling a teacher or a _parent._

"Two _flights?_ " Severus bit out furiously.

"It was only one, and it was an accident, like I said!" Lee said, refusing to look up at either of them.

"Lee! I was farther behind you the time. Dean took a running jump at your bloody backside!" Neville said exasperatedly.

"No," Lee shook his head stubbornly, crossing his arms tightly over his mid-section.

"And that _snowball_ that you got hit with? Geez, if you had any other glasses, they would have been shattered."

"No, no, no," Lee said anxiously, his shoulders slumping down as he hastily tried limping backwards from them both.

"Son, what's wrong with your leg?" Severus asked him in a worried voice as he tried to break through the wall of fear and denial that Lee was building up around himself.

"Nothing, am fine, just fine, no problems, nope," Lee intoned nearly soundlessly, as he continued moving away from them, his back now pronouncedly hunched over as he resolutely stared at the floor.

"Seamus kicked him in the kneecap on his way down. I swear I saw it sir," Neville said quietly to his professor.

"Wait here," Professor Snape said, his lips nearly white with fury, as he whirled angrily out his office door, heading to the class sitting just beyond its old mottled frame.

…

Severus was, in a word, _livid_ , that his son had been targeted so maliciously by his fellow students.

 _His fellow Gryffindor students,_ he thought even more furiously.

"For your next assignment," he said coming to a stop directly in front of that little Finnigan arse-wipe, "I shall be giving you all an option of choices. You can either write three feet on the Cruciatus Curse, or you can choose to interview three people who had endured its casting, and therefore write only _one_ foot about their personal experiences during its casting," he said with a malicious grin. "I shall give you a hint; there are more than three people in just this castle alone who have endured the suffering caused from it. If you can get Mr. Filch to speak of it without giving you a detention in the process, you will only be required to do one interview and _one_ foot. These are due in the next 72 hours," he said, turning his back on the wide eyed stares of disbelief mixed with cries of outrage.

"Bloody git," Mr. Finnigan groused a little too loudly from directly behind him.

"Although, if you stick around, perhaps Mr. Finnigan would be willing to be interviewed," he turned around with a cutting dark glare at the paling boy in front of him.

"If I were the rest of you, I would exit discreetly. _NOW,_ " he barked at the frozen students. Those who had not already done so quickly grabbed their belongings and ran for the door as fast as they could.

"You can't scare me," the snot rag blustered meaninglessly in his face.

He leaned down, putting his hands on the trash heap's desk, and put his mouth right next to the idiot's ear.

"If you ever harm or _touch_ my son again, I will have you picking up the remnants of your own teeth from this very floor," he said very softly next to the vomit bag's head.

"Furthermore," he continued in that same low voice, "if you or any of your little friends _dare_ to retaliate against him or Neville Longbottom, I shall make use of Hermione Granger's curse, and _then_ string you up by your balls," he pulled back from the green hued student's face. "Understand me?" He asked with fake politeness.

"You don't have any proof!" The petulant compost pile whined ridiculously at him.

"Number one, rarely do the innocent reply with such _moronic_ retorts as that. Number two, I _do_. Number three, if you dare to even _mention_ this to a higher authority, or even say, _the media,_ I will smear your name across every _fucking_ paper, school and bloody continent in this known world, for having attempted murder on my only child. In fact, if I were you, I'd personally make myself Lee Snape's new unofficial bodyguard, because if anything _does_ happen to my son, you'll be the first one I'll be blaming." He stood up the rest of the way, looking down in disgust at the miserable slug before him.

"Remember, Mr. Finnigan," he said calmly to the boy who was still trying to look angry even as his hands shook in his effort to put away his things. "Teeth. Floor."

He turned around, still seething, and went back into his office in time to see his child slump into the corner of the room in a tightly constricted ball, Mr. Longbottom beside him in a near panic as his friend became more and more withdrawn.

"Oh Merlin! Please Lee! Snap out of it!" The boy pleaded desperately to his son.

"Mr. Longbottom," Severus said.

"Sir!" The child jumped up towards him, latching onto his arm, clearly wildly upset at his son's worsening state.

"Take a deep breath Mr. Longbottom. I give you my word that I shall take endeavor to care of this," he said, swiftly walking over to where his child was currently trying to burrow mindlessly into the wall.

He slowly put his arms around his son, greatly relieved to not be thrown across the room at his doing so, and picked the boy up carefully. He cradled the boy to his chest protectively as he made his way to the floo entrance. He contacted Minerva and was further relieved to find her between classes.

"Severus! What's going on?" She asked him. She looked at the small lump of boy in his arms and then to the nearly hyperventilating Longbottom standing beside him.

"What has happened?" Her eyes widening as she looked at them fearfully.

"I need Mr. Longbottom to take sanctuary with you for a little while. He is a witness to several serious attacks against my son in the last week. His dorm mates are largely the ones responsible, but they apparently have not been alone in their actions." He stated icily to the increasingly irate woman before him.

"Severus, are you positive of these charges?" She asked, absolutely aghast at the implications of his words.

"Unfortunately, this is the calm version," he said, purposely beginning to rub his son's back, as the lad's continued silence began unnerving him. "You will need to have Mr. Longbottom give you a full account, which I need a copy of as soon as possible," he said, glancing down at his child's tightly scrunched face with more than a modicum of fear himself.

"Of course," the older woman said in mild shock at his words.

"Do not put Mr. Longbottom back alone with those boys until this has been settled more fully," he warned to the nodding woman.

"Longbottom, can you manage to make it to Professor McGonagall's office without mishap? You may use my floo," he added.

"Y-Yes sir," the other boy nodded, nearly as white-faced as Finnigan had been.

Satisfied, he waited until the other boy had made his way to his head of house, before he took his son straight to their quarters via floo as well.


	44. Indeterminate

Ron knew; he _knew_ he knew he knew he knew he knew—oh how he knew.

…

Molly watched her son twist back and forth in his bed that day, wildly agitated about something. He had not said anything even _approaching_ intelligible speech since she had begun sitting with him back before Christmas.

Therefore she watched with undeniable astonishment when he abruptly sat up and began shrieking Blaise's name.

Luckily, Poppy had been the healer on duty at the time within the room itself, and so she had personally been able to completely catalogue the strange outburst.

…

Poppy hadn't been able to sleep well since performing the autopsy of the Zabini child. Oh how she wished there was time to leisurely speak of it to Severus like there had been over the holidays!

Thus, when the youngest Weasley boy abruptly sat up and began screaming the other child's name one afternoon, she knew that she would have to track down the man himself and _make_ the time to speak to him; responsibilities be damned.

…

Severus rocked his child against his chest, speaking to him every so often as he did so. He brushed the errant hair out of the lad's face, and rubbed his back calmly; never letting on to him just how very worried he was about boy's unusual level of fearful mental disconnection.

When his floo roared to life a few hours after their return to his quarters, he fully expected it to be Minerva.

At seeing Poppy come through instead, he abruptly found himself remembering the old trick his father had taught him about the idiocy of making assumptions.

"Severus, I need to speak with you," Poppy said anxiously upon arrival, looking at them both with trepidation openly displayed on her typically austere features.

…

Following Longbottom's surprisingly monotone description of the atrocities performed against his friend that week, and mostly from _her very own students at that_ , she had done the only thing she could think of at the time, and ordered tea from the house elves.

 _It was a simply idiotic response_ , she felt as she sipped her hot tea carefully only scant moments later.

 _But unusual circumstances,_ her brain argued with a surprising amount of logic.

"What's going to happen?" Longbottom's worried voice asked from across her desk, where he sat with his own tea.

 _The sun will set and we shall all go to sleep._ That same idiotic voice tried to declare out loud, but she resisted it that time.

"Likely the authorities may feel a need to get involved; especially if Professor Snape stays as angry as he was this afternoon," she said thoughtfully.

"Biscuit?" She offered, feeling infinitely moronic once more.

…

Molly watched her son begin weeping shortly after finishing his intoning of the dead boy's name. It was the first time she had seen him simply _cry_ since her tenure there next to his bed.

For all of her baby's atypical behaviors, somehow she found this to be the most disturbing of all. His sorrow was so openly _evident_ on his face and within his still thin form; she found it the most difficult to endure.

…

"Severus, I found _this_ rolled up far within the Zabini child's body, charmed to stay as fresh as the day it was written," she said, indicating the small scroll held loosely in her shaking hand, before taking a much deserved seat of her own.

…

Neville thought it was likely the shock of the unusual situation that had prompted his head of house to order tea. _If he'd been the one in charge_ —no, he mustn't think such things; look where that kind of thought had landed his own parents.

He watched the woman as she began pacing the floor, deeply lost in thought.

It was likely that if he hadn't been sitting there, she would have never heard the knock on her office door.

…

Jimmy watched with growing concern towards the situation playing out between its walls.

Of particular worry to him was Hermione, Lee's friend from his first year. She was currently snogging Seamus Finnigan—in his _dorm room—_ the boy responsible for so many of Lee's injuries from that past week, and consequently the one for whom so much of Severus's ire was currently directed towards.

 _Oh my,_ he thought distantly as the two began removing articles of clothing.

He didn't want to watch, but it _was_ intriguing.

…

Lee didn't know where he was, but he knew he was scared, even inside of his daddy's arms.

_Arms?_

Covertly, he reached out a hand and attached himself more firmly to the man's outer robes.

 _There_ ,he thought, slightly more at ease with the impossible situation that was his life. Maybe if he didn't ever talk again, his dad wouldn't ever make him go back out into the hallways alone.

_What about calling him 'daddy'?_

_Hm,_ he thought; his mind _did_ have a good point there.

…

Severus could have leapt with joy when Lee finally attached a small hand to the outside of his robes. The boy didn't make any other overt motions to indicate he was coming out of his SLOB state, but that one small gesture reassured Severus _far more_ than words could ever _begin_ to describe.

Beside him, Poppy was opening the pinkish-brown scroll that she said she had found wedged far within the Zabini boy's body cavity.

 _Desecration of the dead,_ his mind harped at him loudly.

"Have you already perused its contents?" He asked gently, far more willing to speak now that he knew his son was responding somewhat to him.

"Oh yes," Poppy said heavily, her face twisting unpleasantly.

Severus felt his stomach drop.

…

Minerva watched as a flustered Filius asked for permission to speak with her.

Not wanting the Longbottom to overhear, she closed the door behind her and quickly set a high grade silencing spell there in the quiet corridor.

"Are you _aware_ of what assignment Severus has assigned his second year potion's class?" He squeaked indignantly at her.

"Which second year potion's class?" She asked, feeling sure she already knew the answer.

"The Gryffindor and Slytherin _one_ ," he whispered agitatedly, standing on his toes with uncontrollable anger.

"Are _you_ aware that there have just been several attempts on the life of his _son_?" She asked him with a matched level of intensity.

Before her, she watched as the little man turned gray at her words.

…

Ron cried and cried and continued crying, even as he felt his mum's arms tighten their hold on him comfortingly.

"Mummy?" He whispered in a small frightened voice as he finally recognized the woman next to his bed.

From the way her eyes widened and the frequency of her babbles in his ear increased, he could only assume that she had heard him.

But no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't seem to understand what the woman was saying to him.

…

When she had put her arms around her tearful baby boy, the healer—a man by the name of "Turnskell"—cocked an eyebrow at her as though she were insane for having done it. She had chosen to ignore the man as she tried to calm her distraught son.

And then her baby had looked at her, really looked at her, and she saw that the strange disconcerted look in his eyes had faded a bit, right before he completely floored her.

"Mummy?" the boy's heartbreakingly weak voice had finally said to her after so many weeks of unfamiliarity.

In her exclamation of joy, she did not initially notice his confusion to her words, but as it began dying down a bit, she threw a look of her own at the healer, as she realized that her child had not responded to anything else she had said, not even nonverbally.

"Ronnie, look at me. Do you understand me?" She said as sternly as possible to his faded countenance.

He continued to look oddly at her, almost as though she were speaking in a foreign language.

"Healer Turnskell, please!" She insisted desperately, turning to the healer on the other side of the bed.

…

Jimmy watched Hermione Granger and Seamus Finnigan together for what seemed like an awfully long time. He was getting bored with the constant up and down motion, when he noted with some surprise that she had pulled her wand on the boy.

The lad was too busy shuddering under her administrations—ultimately bringing the motions to an end—to notice the change in her demeanor, until it was far too late.

The boy merely looked up at her consternation as she cast the Imperius curse on him. In response, his face turned calm and unlined. She got off of him and stood beside his bed, absentmindedly wiping her inner thighs off on his blankets.

She looked at him and he stood up from his bed, still completely nude. Jimmy watched as they walked together towards the wall of windows, before he climbed up on what had been Lee's bed—at least until Severus had been forced to come rescue him during the previous term.

 _Oh shit,_ he thought as he watched the boy calmly punch both arms through the glass of the window.

The wards were doubled in strength; he knew that for a fact, because it had tickled like mad the entire time.

But now—he looked back in time to see the boy picking up a shard of glass, shortly before being mentally instructed to cut down the lengths of his inner arms with its sharp edge.

…

Lee jerked as he felt Jimmy enter inside his half-conscious state, surprising him with the intensity of his presence.

"Child?" He heard Severus ask him distantly.

…

Severus looked down at his son worriedly.

"Severus, what is it?" Poppy asked; drawn away from the scroll they had been peering over.

With another jerk in his arms, his child abruptly sat up straight in his lap and opened his eyes widely, causing them both to gasp at the iridescent light spilling out of the boy's eyes.

"Boss!" Jimmy's voice came tearing out of the boy's mouth with ferociousness.

"What the hell are you doing!" Severus yelled, finally regaining feeling in his mouth.

"Hermione just cast Imperio on Seamus Finnigan in his dorm room! He just punched through a window and used a piece of broken glass to slice open his wrists!"

The unnatural brightness faded from the boy's eyes as Jimmy removed his presence from his body.

Lee crumpled lifelessly into his dad's lap as chaos began breaking out.

"GO!" Severus roared at Poppy with a wild arm wave towards the floo. "Minerva's office!"

She vanished through the floo entrance, as the normally austere man held the now limp body against his chest, frantically weeping as he feared the worst.

…

"You have to understand that his progress thus far has been nearly miraculous, Mrs. Weasley," Healer Turnskell said to the irate mother staring him down over the bed of one of her youngest.

" _Tell_ me why he can't understand me," she said, pointing at his face angrily.

"Magical withdrawal symptoms are nearly as random and unpredictable as Snitches, ma'am," he said, holding his hands up in helplessness.

"Mummy?" Her child asked her in that same frightened voice as before.

 _Damn whoever did this to him; damn them all,_ she thought virulently.

She sat back down next to him, holding him tightly in her arms. Even if he couldn't understand her, she could still understand _him_.

…

Neville had just about had enough with sitting in McGonagall's office waiting for someone to tell him something when a very disconcerted and irate Madam Pomfrey came bursting through his professor's floo entrance.

"Poppy, what—," Professor McGonagall started saying, only to be cut off with one furious tight lipped glare.

"Gryffindor tower, Minerva! Now!" She yelled, turning around and giving the floo just those directions.

Professor McGonagall only shot him an anxiety laden glare, before quickly following Pomfrey's frantic exit out of the room.

"Huh," Neville said to the now empty office.

…

Jimmy watched Hermione and Seamus anxiously while keeping an equally worried "eye" on Poppy, who now had been joined by Minerva. He saw them floo into the Gryffindor common room, making a beeline for the second year's boy's dorm room.

He watched Hermione calmly instruct Seamus to lie down on Lee's bare mattress, bloody arms facing down and extended.

The two women were hastily pounding up the flight of stairs.

Hermione jerked her head up at the sound and then turned to the steadily bleeding out Seamus, who quickly stood at her silent command and proceeded to climb over the headboard, kicking more glass out of the window pane.

And he cursed his existence as an inanimate object as he saw two things happen simultaneously: The two women burst into the room, as the boy jumped, per Hermione's instructions.

…

Remembering what had happened with Severus and Lee at that very window, Minerva sought to _accio_ the falling boy as soon as she had seen what had happened. But a very somberly faced and naked Hermione Granger made that task very difficult, viciously casting _crucio_ on both women, before making a hasty exit, only stopping to grab her robe on the way out the door.

By the time Minerva had made it to her unsteady feet, she knew that it was too late for Seamus Finnigan.

…

Severus thought his heart had stopped after Jimmy's impromptu, and consequently frantic, possession of his son, until he heard a small sound from underneath his wrapped arms.

"Daddy?"

He choked and found himself unable to do any more than rock their bodies together, and stroke the boy's soft head repeatedly, let alone speak.

"Is it raining?" The innocent voice asked in confusion from his sheltered position.

"No, son," Severus said, feeling the edge of his hysterical spell begin waning upon hearing _that_ question.

"Then why is it wet?" The child asked, stubbornly trying to sit up.

"Because I was overcome with emotion, you impertinent brat," he said, trying weakly for snarkiness.

His son's head poked out defiantly between his arms, looking pale faced and dismayed upon Severus's still wet face. He reached out a small hand and touched Severus's face with almost enough gentleness to compel him to continue on with his emotional outburst.

"Why were you ov'rcome?" the lad asked, having moved on from his earlier state, and subsequent possession, with far more ease than had been expected.

"Because I feared that you might not come back to me," he admitted softly.

He leaned back against the couch cushions and pulled the child more firmly to his chest, trying to silently comfort himself.

"But daddy," his son quietly argued from his position against him, "I'm _yours_. You said so yourself. How could I not?"

If the last question had nearly returned him to tears, then why hadn't this one?

All he could do was lean his cheek over on the boy's soft head and revel in the warmth they were creating between their two bodies.

 _Inside as well as out,_ his mind corrected him silently.

"I suppose nothing else I've ever owned or known has ever obeyed me quite as well," he responded contemplatively.

"I do?" the lad asked in complete surprise at the offhanded praise.

"Mostly, yes," he said fondly.

"Oh," the boy said in contentment.

…

Minerva and Poppy had made their way back down the hallway quickly; asking the portraits for accounts of whether they had seen the girl. They all answered in the affirmative until the Great Hall, where the trail promptly petered out. The portraits on one side of the hallway had seen her come down that way, but no portraits, ghosts, poltergeists or people had seen anything after that.

"Maybe we _should_ involve the headmaster," Minerva had fretted to the older woman as they tiredly decided to give up the chase.

"Try suggesting that again to me _after_ we've both had the Anti-Cruciatus potion that Severus makes," Poppy said dully, as they slowly began making their way down that path once more.


	45. Unpleasant Circumstances

Lee sat comfortably atop his father's lap while Severus spoke with Poppy and Professor McGonagall. It was perfectly fine with him that his father was in no hurry to put him down.

 _He even offered to go to the bathroom with me,_ he thought with an internal giggle.

He wasn't even listening to what they were talking about. He was more interested in studying the differences between his and Severus's hands.

He didn't look up until the words "falling out the window" reached his ears.

The two ladies stopped their explanation and looked directly at him.

"Severus, perhaps Lee could go to his room for a few minutes while we discuss this?" Professor McGonagall asked.

"NO!" He said with a fierce voice, as he grabbed more tightly onto his father's torso.

He had not liked being stuck for so long in the dark place in between waking and sleeping. He had been frightened and was tired of feeling so.

"Son," Severus began softly, laying a hand on his shoulder.

"Please don't make me leave," he begged, grabbing on that much tighter.

"Hush child," his dad said, holding him tightly.

"He's going to know eventually anyways, yes?" Severus asked the two women sitting quietly across from them.

"Hopefully not the complete story," Professor McGonagall said, sounding affronted at the idea.

"The rumors are usually worse anyways," Lee said from where he was burrowing in farther against his father's shoulder.

He heard a sigh, but did not look to see whom it had come from.

"Unfortunately, he's probably right," Poppy said in a resigned voice.

Lee rubbed his face against Severus dark gray cotton shirt. He liked how it felt. He liked how he could feel the strength from his father's arms when he was in this position. His father smelled like Earl Gray tea and rainy days, mixed in with whatever potion smells he had worked with that day.

Around him, the ladies continued talking, but he decided not to listen; knowing that if he asked later on, Severus would explain it to him more easily and quickly than the two women had.

"She's missing?" His father's voice rumbled through them both in surprise.

 _She?_ He thought idly.

He heard McGonagall mention something about Gryffindor Tower.

He tuned their voices out once more as he tried to deductively reason who "she" might be. What girl in Gryffindor was the most unstable right now?

Well, that was easy.

 _Hermione_ , he thought, with a small pang to his heart.

"You'd better change the password for the tower," Lee said, popping up and looking at them seriously.

"The tower?" McGonagall asked, blinking at him.

"Yeah, so she can't get back in and do any more harm," he said, plopping his head back down against his father once more.

…

It was Severus's turn to be clingy with his son. When Minerva suggested putting Lee in the next room, he had been set to argue with her about it. Luckily for them both, Lee's instant reaction was far more powerful than anything _he_ could have come up with.

After his outburst of defiance, the boy had just gone back to ignoring Poppy and Minerva once more, as he went back to his partially hidden position behind Severus's arms.

That is, until the child surprised them all with his astute suggestions. If he knew what girl they were talking about, then he had somehow determined her identity on his own, because neither woman had spoken the Granger girl's name out loud.

Now the boy was back in his baby primate position, nestled in Severus's arms tightly with his own arms and limbs secured tightly around Severus's body.

Poppy raised an eyebrow at them both, but he just gave her a half shrug with the shoulder not currently occupied by his son's head.

…

Ron was asleep.

Molly looked at him as he slept, mentally comparing the before and after images she had of her baby.

He twitched a little and then mumbled something indistinct.

"Polyjuice," he said quite clearly a few minutes later.

She looked across the bed at the healer on duty—young Madam Florensky—and tried to determine if she had just heard what she thought she had.

"No, I heard it too," Madam Florensky said quietly with a confused expression on her face. "Has he had any experience with that particular potion?"

"He's only a second year. I can't imagine _why_ he would have," she answered back in an equally hushed voice.

They looked at each other as the boy between them quieted down.

It was odd all right, and Molly Weasley didn't like it one bit.

…

Abruptly, Minerva realized that with all that had happened that afternoon, she had forgotten that Neville was still—hopefully—sitting in her office.

At her quiet groan, Severus looked up at her in concern—a sight that might have made her laugh on any other day. However, _that_ day, with her eyes still half glazed from shock, thanks to the two Unforgiveable Curses that had been wielded by a favored _second_ year student, it was a look that didn't mean nearly as much as it could have.

"I forgot that Longbottom's been in my office this entire time," she said, standing up slowly. She wished that she would have listened to Poppy's advice and left an hour ago with the older woman; standing was far too painful now.

Severus stood too, his arms still holding the sleeping boy carefully, as though fearful to jostle him, lest he break.

"That is to say," he said, walking into his bedroom while still speaking, " _provided_ you still _have_ an office," he called out sarcastically to her from the other room.

"Fine," she said in a pain tinged voice, " _gloat_. At this rate, Slytherin and Gryffindor will collapse into themselves, while Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff take over the world," she finished, sticking him with a steely eyed glare as he finally made it back into the room.

"I am already quite certain that Fudge must have been a Hufflepuff," the man said in a disgusted tone. He had the boy propped on his left side, with three vials held delicately in the opposite hand; assumedly retrieved from the brief foray in his bedroom.

"You certainly know how to further spoil my mood," she said, eyeing the vials in his hand warily.

He quirked an eyebrow at her, presumably in amusement, before handing her the vials one at a time, giving instructions as he went.

"Take the blue one now, the purple one before you go to sleep, and the golden-brown one upon waking tomorrow morning," he said, looking at her seriously.

"For the pain?" She asked, feeling certain that he would sneer at her question.

"The second one is a combination pain and quick sleep potion," he answered, surprising her with his professional demeanor.

"Who are you, and what have you done with our Potion's professor?" She asked with a haughty look after downing the first vial.

He had resumed his seat on the couch while she had been talking, and was now looking up at her with fathomlessly dark eyes.

"I have experienced the C _rucio_ curse more than most of those who are still alive and mentally sound enough to talk about it. My knowledge of the aftereffects of the curse has been born of numerous pain wrought experiences." He stopped and looked down at the sleeping boy nestled against him. When he next spoke, it was in a severely subdued voice.

"I would not wish that on anyone," he said, not looking away from the peaceful figure of his child.

Minerva could feel the muscle relaxants gradually kicking from the liquid that she had downed only moments before.

"And Longbottom?" She asked in a much calmer voice.

"Keep him safe," the dark eyed man said absently, as he gently stroked his son's soft black hair.

Much like Molly Weasley had done with her son, Minerva McGonagall found herself comparing this Severus to the foreboding Professor Snape that she had only known up until that year. The two personas were now difficult to think of side by side; so much had changed with just the addition of the boy into the man's life.

As she stepped through the floo entrance, she found herself thankful for the creation of one Lee Snape.

Even in light of the other horrors of that year, she knew that Severus's relationship with the boy was a very special one indeed, and had been deserved for some time, for both of them.

Upon arriving back in her office, she was relieved to find the Longbottom boy asleep on the floor, having used his bag as a pillow. Nothing else in the room seemed amiss, and at the end of that very long day, she had truly begun appreciating the small favors.

Quickly she transfigured his chair into a bed, before gently levitating the boy into its soft embrace. Then she left the office, spelling off most of the lights as she went. The vials that Severus had thoughtfully provided for her were safely tucked away in her front pocket, which she had further charmed to provide them with extra padding and protection.

She strode quickly down the hall to the entrance of the Gryffindor tower, intent on putting out any brushfires which might have—and likely had—occurred in the few hours she had been in the dungeons with Severus and Poppy. While she knew that what she most needed now was a good night's sleep, she was also aware that as Hogwart's deputy headmistress, there were certain necessary precautions and procedures to be taken care of before she could even consider resting for the day.

First and foremost on the list was the issue of Seamus Finnigan's remains, as well as the problem of contacting his familial relations. As much as she was loath to do it, she knew that in a situation as grisly and unusual as this was, Albus Dumbledore's help would have to be utilized, regardless of the possible detrimental outcomes such a decision might result in. However, before she made that final step, she felt it necessary to pay a visit to each Pomona and Filius, to determine their positions on this very messy and depressing situation.

She may not have always enjoyed the young boy's brash nature and often callously made remarks, but as her many years there as a Hogwart's professor had shown her, the rough edges of many students' dispositions often smoothed over with time; something she had felt confident would have likely happened to the young Finnigan boy, provided he had been allowed that chance.

Minerva knew that the boy's death had not completely soaked into her consciousness yet, but she hoped that she would handle it with some level of grace when it finally did.

 _At least,_ she thought with a small smirk, _Severus's second year potion's class will have an easier time finding people to interview_.


	46. Dreams

There was a new wraith-like creature wandering the passageways of Hogwarts.

It greatly worried Jimmy to see him as such.

…

That night, Neville lay in his transfigured bed, deeply ensconced in sleep, and therefore at the complete mercy of whatever images his unconscious mind sought to send him.

He was in a vast room, possibly some sort of dilapidated ballroom, complete with huge columns imbedded in the walls and stone archways at every doorway. The doorways were dark and forbidding, and seeing them standing darkly silent all around him filled him with a deep sense of foreboding and dread.

And that was _before_ he began to hear the footsteps skittering across the shadowed distance to his far left. In his dream, Neville whirled towards the source of the sound; his movements far more gracefully coordinated than normally possible.

He peered carefully into the dimness that stretched onwards across the dusty and checkered marble floor, only to be met with more chilling nothingness.

He shuddered and continued walking slowly through the once majestic room.

…

Minerva, having finally allowed herself the luxury of sleep, was now ensnared tightly in her own dream world. In it, she discovered that she was sitting in Albus's office, laughing at the wit of the old man, and feeling much at home while she did so. _This_ was how things were meant to work.

"Minerva," Albus said, turning a serious face to her at last.

The man across the desk from her was the Albus Dumbledore of years past, before the war and its subsequent tragedies. _This_ man was the one whom she had loved, whom she had fought for and done her best for.

The thought sent a perplexing pang through her heart as she absently sought to remember why.

"You are my dearest friend. There are no others that I trust as much as you," the man said, looking—was it _fearfully?_ —into her eyes solemnly.

"What is it Albus?" She asked softly.

"I have made a terrible mistake," he said, standing up from his creaking desk and turning to look out the cracked glass of his windows.

She stood up, taking care not to trip over Fawkes's empty perch, which lay partially hidden under the chair to her right.

"Surely you—," she started to say to her oldest friend, but fell silent as he interrupted her.

"It is my fault," the man said in a hollow voice, still not turning around to face her.

She tried to make her way across the wooden floor of his office, but her trip was delayed as her foot broke through a rotting board, successfully trapping her leg in its moldy embrace.

…

Ron Weasley's dreams held yet more undiscovered memories from his time spent in that dank unknown room.

Lucius Malfoy was once more in front of him, naked and sitting on Ron's legs; effectively trapping him there in the man's hateful presence.

Lucius held a vial of something disgusting looking in his hand, and with a bit of a start, Ron realized that that the blond haired man was speaking to him.

"—polyjuice," he had said to the boy at the time.

Ron had shaken his head in confusion, not focused enough to recognize the sneering demon before him, let alone make sense out of what the creature was saying.

Once more, he watched the man drink the thick copper colored liquid, fully aware that he would not enjoy whatever happened next.

He wasn't mistaken.

Before his eyes, he watched the man transform into none other than Arthur Weasley—a man that Ron recognized even in his altered state of mind. Ron swallowed painfully within the dream as he came to grips with his father's figure, his father's _naked_ figure, sitting before him, smiling a cold hideous smile upon such familiar features.

"What a fine young man you've grown into, my son," his father's figure had said to him. In the dream, he _knew_ that Lucius was behind that well loved face, but at the time of the situation, it was now all too apparent that he had _not_ been capable of discerning between such things.

His dream self now stood beside the two of them, thankfully still wearing his hospital issue pajamas, while the Malfoy-Arthur Weasley creature continued leaning in towards him. Even now, as he understood what had happened, he could not shake the guilt and the shame of his newly acquired memories of that experience.

He did not have to see his father's hand reach between them to grasp his flaccid length to remember the horror of how it had felt. He looked away as tears began to leak out of his eyes, then and now, as his father's figure began sucking on the soft skin of his neck and chest.

Around them, he found more surprises lurking behind several sets of grasping hands and shuttered eyes, as the boys he had been barely aware of then, continued to fuck each other with vicious, painful looking strokes. There were no words spoken, no kindness or love in their actions; no, theirs were the product of rabidly focused blind need. They pounded into one another's bodies with brutal requests of desperation. Ron found himself watching in nausea tinged mortification, unable to look away, even as new sensorial memories began demanding his attention from the darker recesses of his mind.

From behind him, he heard a whimper of pain that he reluctantly recognized as his own.

…

Jimmy watched with a sick kind of anticipation as the pale white figure stopped at a doorway; finally having halted his wandering progression through his quiet hallways.

…

Severus was descending down a poorly lit stairwell towards an unknown destination. Although he did not recognize his surroundings, something about the setting seemed familiar; a feeling that increased with every step he took, leaving him with a very uneasy sensation in his gut.

Although he was unable to see anything save for the steps themselves and the darker shape of the sturdy banister from beside him, he still could not shake the inexorable feeling that someone was indeed watching him.

" _Snivellus,_ " he heard whispered somewhere near him. He had whirled at the sound, but as dreams are often wont towards doing, his movements had been far too slow to allow him to catch the sight of the speaker.

 _If in fact there_ was _anything to see,_ his mind added shakily.

The itch at the base of his spine increased exponentially, filling him with even more certainty that there was someone else there with him.

Far off, perhaps in another room below him, he could hear wild raucous laughter; a sound that he recognized from many years prior as having been issued from the throat of his ex-best friend.

" _Lucius,_ " he whispered into the nothingness facing him.

Abruptly, he heard his own voice speaking back to him, painfully reminding him of what he had found upon discovering Lucius's attack on the boy who was now his son.

"Get off him, Lucius. Now," his words from that day echoed back at him softly, seemingly coming from all directions.

" _Now?_ " A voice whispered near the wall, somewhere below him.

Severus refused to be afraid, and held his ground with bated breath as he waited for the assumed attack.

A moment later, the silence reestablished itself around him, and he forced himself to begin breathing normally once more.

That moment of calm lasted until he felt a small hand latch onto his wrist, causing him to pitch downwards into the unending darkness, his heart beating wildly in fearful surprise.

…

Neville found himself walking through one of the stone archways into a room that was very nearly the twin of the previous room. He had tried to find the creator of the footsteps, but had been unsuccessful. He had hesitantly continued moving forwards, only to halt completely a few steps later after nearly stepping directly into a small puddle of blood. He had walked around it and discovered that its appearance was not an isolated event, as he became aware of the trail leading in the darkness before him.

…

Minerva struggled to pull her foot out of the putty like substance that the floor was slowly turning into around her.

"Albus!" She tried to get his attention for her worsening situation, but the damnable man would not look back at her.

"I could have prevented the death of the Potters," he continued on quietly, ignoring her increasingly frequent calls for help.

The shelves around the room were starting to sag, just like the floor underneath her was. She was trapped up to her knees on both legs, but could not remember when or how her other leg had gotten caught.

Books started to pour their contents onto the floor, into the soupy muck that was sucking everything down around her—except for Albus himself, it seemed.

"And every time I see their child, I am reminded of my failures towards them," he slumped, resting his head against the melting window pane in front of him.

The goop was up to her chest, constricting her airways, closing in on her throat and making her gasp.

"Albus, please!" She tried with her last breath.

At last, he turned around to look at her, and immediately she wished that he hadn't.

His face, like his office, was melting off of his skull, revealing dull patches of grey-white bone in their wake. Albus's beard was the most fearful part of his changed appearance; as it continued growing, its bottom edge crept down his chest in an ever increasing rate of speed.

"Minerva, my dearest friend, you will understand," said Albus's voice within the monstrous figure that was slowly appearing before her.

His lips drooped lower and lower, before finally dropping off completely and becoming tangled in his still lengthening hair.

She gasped for air to scream, but no sound emerged from her lips as they disappeared below the thick sludge of her melted surroundings.

"And that's why I have to kill him. Can't you see that?" The creature who had been Albus Dumbledore said in a clearly audible voice; even as his gums shriveled around his dropping teeth, and his eyeballs dripped white goo down the remnants of his cheeks in a horrible parody of tears.

She awoke with an ill dignified shriek of horror. Her blankets were wrapped tightly around her upper chest and neck, bound to her body by a cold sweat. Minerva unwrapped herself hurriedly, and sat up with a lurch of discomfort, trying to remember the dream, yet wishing never to think of it ever again.

She raised a hand to her head; consequently becoming aware of the wet tear tracks down her trembling cheeks. She wrapped her arms around her torso, hugging against the pervasive fear left behind from the dreadful nightmare.

 _His face_ , she thought with a violent shudder. Yet, while the image had been terrifying, they were nothing compared to the calmly spoken words that he had said to her.

 _And that's why I have to kill him_ , she clearly heard her dream Albus speak again within her mind.

…

Lee looked at Dumbledore in fear as he spoke calmly with Lucius Malfoy in the shadow filled room before him. His dream was not unlike Neville's in many ways, save for the presence of two living figures.

He wanted to move, to run and get away from the two men, but even though his heart beat wildly in fear, it seemed that his feet were well stuck to the dark ground below him. The darkness swirled around him like fog, making him feel as though he was slowly drifting into nothingness. It frightened him more than the identities of the men before him. He desperately wanted to call out for help, but his fear had clamped down on his vocal cords, making it impossible to make a sound.

…

Severus looked around his settings with widening eyes as he slowly realized where he was. He lay naked on a bed, both wrists tied in front of him, and a leering Malfoy sitting over him.

 _Oh Merlin, no_.

"Daddy, are you okay?" He heard from just beside his head.

He turned to the side and was confronted with the image of his son peering worriedly at him.

_Why on earth wasn't the boy running?_

_Run,_ he tried to say, but only blood came from his mouth, staining the pristine sheets underneath him. From beside him, Lucius had started taunting him cruelly, but he had no eyes for the bastard. Instead, he could only plead with his eyes towards the boy, trying to make him see the danger and _go_ , before it was too late.

"Don't worry daddy. I won't leave you by yourself," the boy said in complete misunderstanding to his increasingly desperate looks.

Lucius had begun milking his cock, and quite against his will it began rising to its own accord. What kind of man was he to allow his child to witness such a depravity?

…

Neville finally stopped his seemingly endless trek through the cavernous and apparently long forgotten dimly lit rooms. The blood trail had stopped, and naturally he had lifted his eyes off of the floor, only to be met with an unlikely sight.

"Harry?" He found himself asking, even though he knew that the other boy's name was now Lee.

The boy sat naked on the floor, his thin legs curled up against him tightly, making him look even smaller than he already was.

Neville blinked and the boy's features changed dramatically; black hair became pale blond, and vibrant green eyes turned into piercing chips of gray.

"Malfoy?" He whispered in shock, taking a step back only to trip hard, echoed with a jerk in his physical body.

The jerk caused him to snap his eyes open, there in McGonagall's unlit office, where he lay upon the transfigured bed that had appeared at some point in his slumber. He grimaced and rubbed a hand over his eyes, trying to remember what it was that he had dreamt about, but without much luck.

 _Something about a room,_ his mind thought incoherently as the dream drifted further away.

He sat up slowly, feeling very stiff in all of his joints.

It took him only a moment longer to realize that he was not alone there in his professor's office.

…

Severus awoke with a loud gasp, sweat beaded across his forehead as he sought to remove himself from the horrible nightmare.

Remembering more of what had happened in his dream; he reached out blindly for his son, fearfully needing the tactile reassurance of his son's safety. He relaxed as his fingers touched the soft hair of the boy's head, but it worried him that the child was so warm to the touch. He cast a weak illumination spell across the room and looked down at the lad.

Lee's hair was matted to his head and his cheeks were bright pink. While Severus watched him, the boy began moaning piteously in his sleep, making Severus's heart sink painfully.

He carefully pulled the lad farther into his arms, before putting the back of his hand across the child's forehead. He instantly hissed and pulled his hand back worriedly. The boy was burning up with fever, and now had also begun tossing in agitation, making him momentarily forget his own nighttime disturbances.

"Lee," he said firmly although softly; trying to draw the boy out of his dream gently.

The boy only responded by coughing harshly against him.

Without another word, Severus picked his son up and strode quickly into the next room, foregoing his robe in favor of contacting Poppy as quickly as possible.


	47. Sick

Poppy had gotten to their quarters quickly after being contacted by a tense faced Severus. She moved quickly; knowing that the only thing that could cause Severus to break from his long held separation from outward emotionality was concern over his son.

She walked from the floo to discover that Severus and Lee were both spread out on the couch before her. Severus's long legs stretched the full length of the cushions, while he leaned against the far cushioned side arm. The much smaller figure of his son lay draped atop the unusually pale faced man, a blanket wrapped tightly around the boy, while Severus lightly rubbed his thumb over the child's fevered cheeks.

He did not look up at her entrance into the room, but she had no doubt that he had registered her presence.

"I could not wake him this morning," Severus said in a low voice.

She strode over to where they were both positioned and knelt down to take a closer look at his son. Lee's breathing was shallow and raspy, and sweat was beaded across his forehead and inflamed cheeks. The boy's hair was damp with sweat, further shrinking the child's already thin features.

She noticed with some interest that although she was now quite close to the both of them, Severus had not yet taken his attentions away from the boy long enough to face her—nor had he curbed his loving administrations to the lad's face.

She ran her tests on the child, and then with barely a second thought, discreetly ran similar diagnostics on the boy's father as well.

"It's a particularly nasty virus that's going around both muggle and wizarding schools right now. Luckily, in the magical world, the severity of the virus can be much lessened, reducing the timeframe of his illness by half if not more. His fever should break within the next 72 hours or less, and he should be fine in a day or two after that," she said; her explanation finally gaining the attention of the dark eyed man before her.

She stood up and took her usual seat in the armchair perpendicular to her two boys.

"How high is his fever now?" He quietly asked her.

"It's hovering around 102 F (38.8 C) now, which is by no means pleasant, but I think we can get it down into a more manageable range without too much due fuss," she said, before standing and moving back over to the floo's entrance once more; intent on retrieving a more specific potion from her infirmary supplies than the one she had brought with her.

Before stepping through, she had another thought and turned back to look at them.

"Severus," she said, commanding his attention, even if his gaze was somewhat unfocused.

"He's going to be fine," she said, looking carefully at him.

He didn't speak, but nodded his understanding to her slowly. She was struck by how much younger his face looked around his lost and concerned eyes, reminding her strongly of the adolescent he had once been.

Impulsively, she made her way back over to where they were still sitting, before leaning over and hugging him tightly. Upon standing, she lightly kissed his forehead, in a motion much reminiscent of his own loving gestures to the boy held carefully in his arms.

"You are doing a wonderful job as a father," she said with pride, after straightening up once more.

She watched with mild amusement as Severus's ears turned a bit pink, but she was pleased to see him grace her with a small smile regardless.

"Thank you Poppy," he said, ducking his head in discomfort from their unusually emotion laden moment.

"I'll be right back," she said, unnecessarily feeling the need to reassure the uncharacteristically shy man sitting before her.

As she stepped through the green flames to her infirmary, she thought back to the days when he first had attended Hogwarts as a boy younger than Lee was now. He was an extremely gifted potions master, but anyone with two brain cells to rub together could easily see his giftedness in those early days. After seeing him in her domain nearly as much as Lee did now, she had fallen in love with the dark eyed boy who had truly believed himself to be unlovable.

Poppy had never been married, but she had been pregnant once, long before either boy came into her life. She had been just a girl herself, and her parents had been most insistent upon her giving the little boy away for adoption as soon as the infant had come into being.

When Severus had entered into her world, his heart every bit as tattered as his second hand mismatched clothes, she had found herself wondering for the first time in many years whether her own child had grown up loved and cherished, or cruelly misused, like the highly creative lad with the beautiful eyes had been.

How anyone could not appreciate the boy, whom she had seen a multitude of times over the course of his seven years there under her watchful eye, she would never know. She was well aware that she had not been the only one to protest his unacceptable home situation to Dumbledore, and had later wondered, on more than one occasion, if they had really done all they had been capable of in his situation.

While it had been of little surprise to her that he had become a death eater, her only concern had been whether or not he would live long enough to realize the error of his ways. She had always known that Severus had a kind heart, but unfortunately for those around him, it was buried deeply under many layers of humiliation and anger. It had been bad enough for him to have to face the abuse at his supposed home, but to see the boy also suffer there at Hogwarts had almost been too much to bear.

In reaction, she had strove to show him how a _real_ adult was supposed to act around a child in his or her care.

 _Unlike that fool Dumbledore,_ she growled bitterly to herself.

As she stepped back out of the floo and into Severus's quarter's once more, the vial of potion securely clasped in her hand, she found herself smiling at the man Severus had finally started becoming.

 _And all it took was one little boy_ , she thought with a mental shake of her head, still surprised by how the situation had come about.

…

If Neville's shock had not been so great, he would have shrieked aloud at the uninvited visitor whose cold eyes had greeted him upon waking.

"Draco?" Neville finally asked in a trembling voice.

…

For once, Ron was awake and his mummy was not. She was asleep on the transfigured bed beside him, nearly in reach.

He knew that she was his mummy, but whether or not he was aware of all that the title entailed was anyone's guess. For some reason, he longed to touch her, but his arms were still bound to the bed somehow, keeping him from his wish.

His memory was coming back in leaps and bounds, but there were still several gaps left to be filled that either he was unaware of or simply could not figure out on his own. It seemed to him that if he could touch his mummy, things would be better, simply because they always had been.

Largely, he rather hoped that his memories were false, because he couldn't make himself fathom the extent to which he and his surroundings had been such torturously mishandled. The problem wasn't just in what had been done to him, but also what he had _done_ to others, like Harry.

Harry was his first friend there at Hogwarts, and he _knew_ that Harry's actions with Lucius had been in an attempt to save him and Hermione from the same fate. It seemed like a terribly simple truth, but it was also one that he wasn't sure he had actually known— _before_.

He was terribly afraid that he really had attacked his best friend, beating him badly, before doing an unspeakable thing to him; something which he wouldn't even allow himself to visualize, so shameful it had been to remember. How could he have done _such_ a thing to his best mate?

He jerked a little in his magical bindings and looked at his mummy's peaceful face. How could she look so peaceful when he was so very confused?

"Mummy," he said quite clearly.

The healer, the third of Poppy's associates, was a woman referred to as Madam Swinta. She heard the boy's request, even if his mother had not, and decided to interfere only if it became necessary to do so.

"Mummy," the boy repeated, speaking louder and bouncing up and down a bit in his restrictive position, causing the mattress to squeak slightly.

Molly rolled over and opened her eyes slowly and he grinned at her.

"Mummy!" He said joyfully.

Ron was happy that he been able to communicate at least _one_ of his needs.

The Fless cravings were at an all time low, but he had no thoughts about that. His mummy was awake and she would fix everything.

 _Maybe_ , he allowed himself to admit.

"Good morning to you, my beautiful boy!" She spoke enthusiastically.

He didn't understand the message, but he knew that there was love behind the words.

"Mummy!" He said happily, swinging his arms as best he could within his bindings.

"Madam Swinta," Molly said, turning to the slightly older woman. "Is there any way that we could remove the bindings from his arms anytime soon? Or perhaps lengthen their reach?" She asked.

The older healer looked thoughtful before admitting that she would need to get permission from Poppy before doing such a thing. She did not tell the hopeful mother who sat across from her that as promising as this was looking now, it could easily go downhill in an instant.

"Mummy," Ron said, grasping her arm now that she was close enough to touch.

"Yes sweet baby?"

"Mummy," he said, crinkling his brow in concentration. "Mummy, Har-rrrry," he said, slurring the word with difficulty.

Molly blinked at him in surprise—an expression echoed by the other woman.

"I'm assuming he's referring to Harry Potter, then?" Madam Swinta said questioningly.

"They're best friends," she said with a small smile. "They made friends on the train their first year."

"Har-ry," Ron said more clearly.

He looked at her intently. She would know what to do.

 _Maybe_ , that same thought passed quickly through his mind once more.

"Harry."

…

Lee felt bad.

Lee felt incredibly and hideously bad.

He had heard Severus and Poppy speaking that morning, but had not been able to drum up enough strength to open his eyes. Based on their conversation, he knew that he had a fever, but he also knew that they were taking care of him and would continue to do so.

So in a way, it was okay that he felt hugely awful, because he was going to be taken care of and would not have to worry about such things while in his semi-conscious state.

His father had made him take a few nasty tasting potions, but he hadn't argued or tried to get away from them. He wasn't sure whether or not Severus was aware of his semi-awake state, but it didn't matter, because he knew that if anything were to go wrong, Severus would likely know before he even had a chance to speak.

After he had successfully downed the potions, Severus had praised him for his compliance. His father wasn't one to compliment others very frequently, and he found that the simple words made him feel much better than the potions ever could.

"Come Lee, you need to eat something," Severus said, lifting the boy's upper body up a bit as he sat back down under him. Lee's torso and head were now resting on his father's lap.

"You don't have enough weight to afford skipping meals, even if you are sick," his father said, caressing his fevered cheek with his thumb. Severus opened Lee's mouth and slipped a bit of warm oatmeal in his mouth, before closing his mouth again.

"Can you swallow that for me child?" His daddy asked him gently.

 _For you? I'll try_ , he thought dimly.

He focused on the warmth in his mouth and concentrated on working his throat muscles accordingly.

Still not opening his eyes, he smiled a little up at his father to show that he had done what had been asked of him.

"Very good son," his father said lovingly.

Lee felt his smile increase with that short sentence, even if the task had been rather meager.

He had yet to open his eyes, fearing that the light would make him hurt. Likewise, the room was still spinning all around him, while his muscles felt like tapioca and his joints ached fiercely, but it made no difference to the boy. His father was going to take care of him, just like he'd asked him to do. And so when Severus asked him to try to swallow another bite, he did so without complaint.

He was being _taken care of!_

He sniffed the air and smelled something warm and minty infusing the air from somewhere beside his head.

"I have some hot peppermint tea here for you to drink, if you think you can. It should soothe your insides further," his father said after seeing the action.

He nodded very slightly; quite sure that moving more vigorously would result in less than pleasant circumstances for either of them.

He felt the muscles under him shift as his daddy reached for the mug of tea. Shortly thereafter, he could tell from the smell and warm heat that the mug was very close to his mouth and nose. He opened his mouth without being told.

"Just small sips for now, child," his father rumbled against him.

Severus _did_ know best. The tea felt perfect against his palate and throat, sliding down into his stomach gently, relaxing him further.

He felt his consciousness slipping away from him, and realized that his daddy must have noticed as well, because very shortly he found the man's strong arms wrapped carefully around him once more.

 _Like always_ , his mind whispered contentedly.

…

Severus looked down the brightly flushed boy laid halfway across his lap. Leaving one arm wrapped carefully around the boy's still too thin shoulders, he brought his other hand up to stroke his son's hair gently. It was likely that the muggles had never touched the boy with such careful regard; a fact he was reminded of every time he stroked the child's hair or face. The boy's reaction—conscious and _unconscious_ —was nothing short of joyful each and every time that Severus touched him thus. His tension filled muscles always relaxed significantly against Severus's skilled fingertips, further making the man thankful that _he_ was the one who had been entrusted with his care.

The boy radiated need and trust towards him; something that was only becoming more noticeable as he further came to know the boy he now called his son.

It was a dreadful thought to think of how the boy might have been taken advantage of later in his life, just in exchange for that soft touch that he so obviously craved.

Abruptly the floo flared to life and he looked up in mild anxiety, his fingers unconsciously curling on his wand, even as Poppy walked briskly through the greenish flames.

"How is our young Mr. Snape?" She asked softly, walking over them both. She immediately pulled out her wand and began running a few diagnostics.

He released his hold around his wand and moved his hand so that it rested lightly on the boy's torso. It still amazed him that his hand was quite nearly the same length of his child's stomach.

"I managed to coax him into eating a few bites of oatmeal, before downing about a third of a cup of hot peppermint tea," he said calmly to the medi-witch.

"And I'm sure you'll keep trying to do such," Poppy said, before drawing the armchair in closer to them and sitting down lightly.

"However, you are not here to speak to me about that, are you?" Severus asked astutely, leaning back against the cushion more fully.

"Two birds with one stone," she said reassuringly patting his leg.

He raised a sardonic eyebrow at her motion, but did not otherwise speak.

"I had every intention of showing you the scroll yesterday, but as you well know, we were unfortunately interrupted," she said, suddenly looking much older to him.

She opened her kit and pulled out a wooden cylinder. She opened it carefully and pulled out the aforementioned object, before handing it to him.

"I take it that you checked it for curses?" He asked warily, not trying to insult her.

"Yes."

He took the small scroll and opened it delicately on the armrest beside them. It was an odd quirk, but he did not want to block his view of the boy in his care, even for a moment.

" _Fless = Flesh_ ," it read in damp looking lettering.

"You said that it was charmed to stay fresh, correct?" He asked after a moment, handing the document back to her with some distaste, before reestablishing his protective hold around his child.

"Correct. And before you ask, I'll answer your question—yes, it is written in blood," she said wearily.

They sat in morbid silence for a moment as he thought carefully through his memory for possible connections to that strange worded phrase.

"I suppose that you don't know what fless is either," Poppy said after another minute.

"I think I would have remembered something as heinous as it, but it is possible that I simply do not know this particular name for it," he admitted slowly, his eyes narrowing in thought.

"I rather hope that I never have cause to hear of it again," Poppy said darkly.

Her tone caused him to glance at her, but he could understand her venom for it, considering what havoc it had already wreaked upon their lives.

 _And those are only the bits we know about thus far_ , his mind said staidly.

"I'm calling another meeting between heads, but this time I want my associates to be involved as well," she said, suddenly fixing him with a look that brooked no argument.

"All of them?" He asked, clearly aware of the rotation schedule through the youngest Weasley's room.

"I think that if we have the meeting somewhere close to the infirmary, if not in the infirmary itself, the boy should be fine, provided that Molly stays with him the entire time," she said readily.

"When do you want to schedule this meeting for?" He asked, narrowing his eyes at her.

"Tonight," she said quietly. "As soon as possible," she said, standing and heading back towards the floo entrance.

"I'm not leaving him here by himself," he said in a hard voice.

"You can bring him," she said with a knowing look. "He's likely to sleep through it all anyways."

"And where do you suggest I put him? Just keep him in my lap the entire time?" He asked incredulously.

Poppy turned and shot him a look, grinning slightly.

"No, do not even think it," he said, as she grabbed a handful of floo powder.

"You're not ashamed of him, I feel sure," she murmured lightly over the sound of the green flames.

"You of all people—," he said, but was cut off by her sudden exit from his quarters.

He closed his mouth and looked at the boy across his lap in slight consternation. Perhaps even more annoying was the smile he now found plastered on the child's sweat tinged face.

"If you are awake enough to smile, you are awake enough to eat," he said in some exasperation.

_Merlin, why does she always get the better of me?_


	48. Familiarities

Neville looked across the bed at Draco in fearful shock. The boy was naked and nearly pale enough to be confused with a ghost. His hair was tousled in a completely undignified manner, and he had heavy bruising around his neck and arms.

When Neville had spoken to him, Draco had twitched slightly, but otherwise had not responded.

"Good Merlin, what happened to you?" Neville wondered out loud to the silent thin figure before him.

The quiet image sitting before him was causing his mind to shriek déjà vu at him. His mind went back to his dreams. Hadn't Draco showed up at one point?

"Are you cold?" Neville asked softly, ignoring the fact that he was asking the question to one of his most hated enemies.

Draco's eyes lifted from he had been staring at the bedspread determinedly.

"Cold," the other boy said in a raspy whisper; his arms wrapped tightly around himself as he shivered. His bloodshot eyes peered carefully at Neville through greasy locks of hair.

Neville thoughtfully looked around the tousled blankets that were around them, not wanting to scare the boy across from him with any sudden movements. Luckily for them both, Neville had kicked a layer of covers completely off the bed in the night; now allowing him to retrieve them without having to move Draco.

He carefully got down from the bed and leaned towards the blankets, keeping his eyes on the blond haired boy the entire time, not trusting him with anything. Draco's eyes followed him as well, especially as he started making slow movements towards the naked boy. He held the blanket in such a way that Draco could still see the location of his arms and fingers. He didn't know what the boy had been through in the past weeks—months?

_Could it really have been that long?_

Even though he wasn't sure what had happened, he could tell that the other boy was terrified and unsteady in his surroundings—nearly a complete opposite from his previous persona.

He found that the boy's turnaround in behavior rather unnerved him; so he moved slowly, not wanting to accidentally cause any negative reactions.

"I'm going to drape this around your shoulders, is that okay?" Neville asked in a calm voice when he was only an arm's length away.

"Cold," Draco repeated himself, nodding at the larger boy next to him.

Neville stepped a bit closer, and stretched the blanket around the thin white shoulders, draping them loosely and delicately. He wanted the blond boy the chance to easily remove himself from the constraints of the blanket if need be.

Once he was done, he stepped away, and looked sadly at the boy before him.

"Is that better?" He asked quietly.

Draco looked out of hollowed eyes and nodded quickly, before looking away and pulling the blanket tighter around himself.

…

After having listened as Severus made arrangements to cancel his classes for the day, Lee found himself feeling both guilty and pleased. He was going to have Severus to himself for the rest of the day, maybe the rest of the weekend then, since the next day was Saturday.

But still, that small voice that sounded an awful lot like Uncle Vernon kept speaking up; calling him a waste of time, and an unnecessary burden to his father. After all, he'd been sick or injured worse than this when he had been younger, and no one had bothered to care for him then. He didn't want Severus to think he was too much trouble to keep around.

The feelings became even worse after his nausea picked up intensity. He hadn't even said anything, but Severus had already noticed.

"Son?" Severus asked in a concerned voice.

"Bathroom," he answered in a desperate voice.

His father picked up gently, yet hastily, and carried him into his bathroom.

No sooner had Severus put him down, than Lee had found himself vomiting forcefully into the toilet bowl. It seemed as though everything he had ever eaten in his entire _life_ was trying to come up at once.

He heaved until only strings up spit were coming up, but his body would not quit convulsing. Suddenly he realized that his father's hand was on his back, rubbing his quivering muscles comfortingly. In turn, he tried to make a conscious effort to relax, which was helped as Severus began speaking to him soothingly.

"Take deep breaths child. That's the way, in and out," Severus said quietly, wiping his face with a cool washcloth.

Finished for the moment with the decimated remains of his stomach, he sank back away from the porcelain bowl and leaned against his father weakly.

"Urg," he said. He felt worse than he had before; something he had not thought possible.

Severus flushed the toilet before picking him up once more in his arms and carrying him back to the couch. Once there, Severus held a glass of water of in front of his lips and he drank gratefully; trying to clear the taste out of his mouth without getting sick again in the process.

"Let's see if we can't avoid doing that again in the near future," Severus said, lifting a potion vial to his lips carefully.

He tried not to smell it, and drank it down quickly.

"If you can hold that down, your stomach should begin feeling much better in a few minutes or so," Severus told him.

Lee was still draped across his father's lap, but after having been so sick, he wanted the warmth of his father's body against his. He weakly sat up and tried to face Severus, but his body was not cooperating with him and he slumped back down.

He smiled when his father picked him up gently and set him in his most favorite position—his SLOB position. He pushed his sweating brow up against his father's shoulder while Severus wrapped a blanket around him, before doing the same with his arms. Severus held him closely, but not too tightly, given the recent history.

"Am I a waste of time?" Lee asked after they had been sitting there quietly for a moment.

"Certainly not," his father answered in an affronted voice.

"But I'm a lot of trouble," Lee said, sniffling pitifully.

His father surreptitiously wiped his nose with a handkerchief.

"No worse than any other sick child," he rumbled against him. "In fact, I would say that you are _easier_ to take care of than other children."

Severus rubbed the boy's cheek gently as they lapsed back into comfortable silence.

"And you love me, right?" Lee asked after a few more minutes. He knew he was probably being childish, but he needed to hear him say it again.

"Yes," Severus said with emphasis.

"Why do you love me though? The Dursleys—," he broke off with an unexpected sob, before regaining his composure somewhat. "The Dursleys didn't; so why do you?"

"Oh child," his father lamented somberly, calmly continuing to rub his back.

"Are you sad daddy?" He asked in a tiny voice.

"Yes."

"Are you mad at me?"

"NO." His father said forcefully, pulling him in tighter against his chest.

"I love you child, and for many reasons. I love you for your gentle kindness, and your intelligence, most of all," Severus said slowly, thoughtfully.

"I'm not smart though," Lee argued half-heartedly.

His father pulled him away from his chest and looked him in the face sternly.

"What did you say?" He growled at him.

"I'm not smart. I mean, I'm not stupid, but I'm not really that bright or anything," he said in a quivering voice. He remembered how many times the Dursleys had called him a moronic idiot, and thought that he was doing pretty good just to admit to having any intelligence at all.

"That is easily the stupidest thing you've ever said," Severus said, pulling him back against his body once more.

"You are _extremely_ bright; enough to have given Ms. Granger a run for her money, provided you were to fully apply yourself. Why on earth do you think I would want to spend time with you if you were just another moronic half-wit like Crabbe or Goyle?" His father demanded vehemently. "I spend enough time around idiotic children as it is! I would not choose to voluntarily do so in my free time as well," he growled seriously.

"You _like_ to spend time with me?" He asked in an incredulous voice.

"Were you not just listening to me child? Perhaps we should have your hearing checked as well," he added sarcastically.

"It's just, it's just that no adult has ever said that to me," he mumbled quickly against Severus's shoulder.

 _I'm pathetic,_ he thought miserably.

"Well, _this_ adult _is_ saying it to you. Silly boy. Why on earth would I adopt you if I did not enjoy your company?" He asked exasperatedly, even as he kissed the child's burning forehead.

"I love you daddy," he responded softly, having been happily affirmed.

"And I love you, sweet child," Severus responded, shifting his body so they were both lying down on the couch once more.

"I believe that it is time for a nap," his daddy said, wrapping Lee in a protective hug.

"You too?" Lee yawned.

"Me too," Severus agreed softly.

…

Minerva's stomach did its own flip-flop as she walked into her office that morning. Sitting atop the transfigured bed were _two_ boys, instead of the one that she had left in there the previous evening. Furthermore, upon closer inspection, she realized with a gasp that she actually _recognized_ the other boy as none other than Draco Malfoy himself.

"Mr. Malfoy?" She asked in an uneasy voice.

The two boys turned at the sound of her voice. Malfoy, however, gave a completely undignified squeak and curled up into himself, under one of the blankets.

"Professor," Longbottom said calmly, in a steady voice. "Please don't speak too loud or move too fast, okay?"

"Are you all right Mr. Longbottom?" She asked carefully.

"I'm fine," Longbottom said with a gentle smile. "But I think Draco needs to be seen by Madam Pomfrey," he said.

 _Draco?_ _Longbottom just referred to Malfoy as_ DRACO?

"Certainly," she answered confidently. "Do you think young Mr. Malfoy will be to handle himself appropriately if I attempt to fire call her?"

"Maybe if you set a silencing spell," Longbottom said, biting his lip nervously.

She did, but she kept an eye on the two boys behind her the entire time as well. She quickly informed Poppy that her presence was required in her office immediately, but refused to say more until the other woman had joined her.

…

Madam Pomfrey stepped through the floo into Minerva's office with more than a little trepidation. The sight that greeted her merely reinforced her fears, but she did not allow the emotions to override her sense of decorum for the delicate situation.

Mr. Malfoy, a face that she actually was relieved to be seeing once more, looked at her with frightened eyes. The familiar sneer that typically sat upon his face was gone, _along with his clothes_ , she noted as she got closer to him.

"It's okay Draco; she's not gonna hurt you," Neville said slowly to the other boy.

Malfoy, who had looked close to bolting, relaxed a bit at Neville's calm words, but continued to look at her with large eyes, watching her every movement carefully.

"I think it might be best if you set a sleeping spell on him," Minerva said quietly out of the corner of her mouth.

Neville looked at them both, before setting his jaw and standing up. He moved gingerly to the side of the bed where Malfoy was huddled, and slowly held out his hand to the boy.

"Come on Draco," he said patiently.

Draco Malfoy looked at each of the three people before him, and then came to a decision of his own. He touched Neville's hand, once, twice and then finally latched onto it tightly the third time, as though never to let go again.

Neville pulled a bit, and finally Draco was standing beside the bed, the blanket draped around his shoulders piteously. His head was bowed, and his stringy locks hung in his face in a disorderly fashion. He and Neville made their way over to the floo, and Poppy noted with dissatisfaction that the blond boy was limping heavily.

"I'll go through first, I think," Poppy said, nodding to the other woman carefully.

The familiar green flames lit her path as she stepped forth into the comforting zone of her infirmary.

It took nearly another five minutes before the floo belched again; pushing forth Neville and a wild eyed Draco through. The smaller, pale skinned Slytherin huddled closer to the round faced Gryffindor fearfully, if not entirely trustfully.

Still, Poppy was amazed that the Gryffindor boy had managed to convince Draco to follow him at all.

 _Maybe it's because he isn't an adult_ , she thought.

Minutes later, Minerva joined them, entering the infirmary much more gracefully than any of them had.

Poppy set to getting Draco into a bed, utilizing Neville as much as possible in the process. She put the boy on the same end that Lee had often found himself on, but not in the same bed. She curtained off the area, but allowed Neville to stay with the boy until she had administered dreamless sleep.

Finally the 2nd year boy was asleep and she looked at Minerva in relief.

"I'd best notify Severus," she said slowly, eyeing the Longbottom child carefully.

"If you wouldn't mind staying with them, Minerva, it would greatly ease my mind," she said with a tired smile.

She quickly walked into her office, and activated the floo there. She had no desire for her conversation to be accidentally overheard by anyone else.

 _Even Minerva_ , she thought decisively. This was a Slytherin issue, and she was going to make sure that it stayed within their house.


	49. Clarifying

They were staring at him. It wasn't his imagination; everyone, with the exception of Poppy and Minerva, was staring at him.

He shifted his SLOB slightly as he crossed his legs, continuing to glare back at everyone as he did so. Why Poppy was hell-bent on having a meeting _today_ of all days, was beyond him. Lee was still running a fever, and though his nausea had finally settled down, he was in no condition to be left alone in their quarters while they came up with ideas.

Severus had been awake and watching his son sleep by the time that Poppy had fire-called him that afternoon, but his child had not been. Lee was still laid out atop his chest, his much smaller body moving up and down slightly with each breath Severus took. After telling him about Draco Malfoy's return, Severus had been more than a little shocked, but he had kept himself under control until her departure.

And now they were in the infirmary's meeting room, sitting in squashy armchairs around a large circular oak table, staring at one another while they waited for Poppy to start the meeting. Both the armchairs and the table had randomly appeared that morning, thanks to Jimmy. Moreover, the chairs were all cerulean blue; a fact that Severus found more than a little humorous.

His son was curled up against his chest; his head resting on Severus's shoulder, and one hand fisted in the loose material of his robes. The boy was largely asleep, but had already surprised Severus once by opening his eyes and smiling at him. Severus held the boy against him carefully with one hand, while continuing to rub soothing circles on his back with the other. Before they had come, Severus had managed to get the child to eat a little applesauce and drink an entire glass of water. He hoped that he would not be forced to see either element again that night.

He was sitting between Poppy and Minerva. He looked to his left where Poppy was sitting, and saw with little surprise that she was rifling through both Ron Weasley's and Blaise Zabini's medical charts. At his right, Minerva was speaking rather energetically with one of Poppy's colleagues, a man whose name had currently escaped him.

 _Their presence at either side of me is probably a strategic move on their parts_ , he thought to himself with intrigue.

His eyes wandered through the room's inhabitants, not stopping on anyone for any length of time. The staring wasn't nearly as obvious as it had been initially, but it was still noticeable, particularly from the non-Hogwarts people, with the exception of Poppy's colleagues, who were sitting in a row to his right.

 _Poppy must have decided to allow Molly to be alone in the room with her son for the evening,_ he mused.

Similarly, to his and Poppy's left, sat Filius and Pomona, seemingly deep in conversation with each other, yet furtively casting looks in his direction every so often.

Spanning the gap between the two sides of the group were two more familiar faces, Arthur Weasley and Kingsley Shacklebolt. He realized that all of the chairs at the table were filled save one.

And then _he_ walked into the room.

Severus felt his eyes narrowing in disdainful disbelief as he saw none other than Remus Lupin, the _werewolf_ , the _Marauder_ , stroll into the room and take the last remaining chair.

Minerva abruptly laid her hand on his arm and he realized that he was growling slightly. He forced himself to take a deep breath and contain his fury at seeing one of the men who had made his life hell during his schooldays.

Around him, the conversations had completely quieted, and Severus saw that the room's inhabitants were now staring at both him _and_ Lupin.

He steadied himself and swore that _he_ would not be the one to start something; not now, not with Lee present in his arms.

Speaking of the child, Lee shifted in his arms then, peering up into Severus's face with a concerned look.

"Daddy?" The child asked very softly.

…

Intuitively, Lee turned and looked around the room. There were several faces that he didn't recognize, but there was one in particular that was staring straight down on them, making him uncomfortable.

When Lee looked directly at him, he saw the unkempt man's face light up with excitement of some kind. Unconsciously, he found him gripping his dad's robes even closer and tighter than he had been. The man was looking at him with the crazed eyes of any other _Harry Potter_ fan, and he didn't like it one bit. He turned his head away from the man's bright eyes and hid his face against his daddy's shoulder once more.

The fever still raging in his body chose that moment to turn him cold, making him shiver violently against his father. Severus reacted by reaching for the blanket he had brought with them, and arranging it more securely against him, followed shortly thereafter by a quick warming spell. Slowly he felt his shaking limbs decrease their frenetic movements, just in time for Lupin to speak those all too familiar, dreadful words.

"Harry? Harry Potter? Is that you?" Lupin said to him incredulously from the other side of the table.

The silence in the room was now overwhelming as the collective members of the room held their breaths, waiting on the supposed outburst that would surely come from Severus at any moment. However, Lee was the first to react, thereby robbing Severus of his chance.

"IT'S _**SNAPE!**_ " The boy turned and shrieked at the man. " _LEE SNAPE!_ _Harry Potter_ is a MYTH! He doesn't _exist!_ Now, _leave me_ _ **alone**_ , or my _daddy_ will _beat you up!_ " He finished with a sob, turning back to his daddy, his thin shoulders shaking with his angry tears.

…

Severus held the crying boy tightly, yet proudly, rubbing his back soothingly once more. He was worried that the child might make himself sick again, but he still managed to relish the expression that had appeared on Lupin's face during the boy's outburst.

"I guess that takes care of some of the introductions," Poppy said soberly.

Severus heard a few people snort at her words, and he discretely gazed at Lupin from the corner of his eye, trying to further gauge his reaction.

For his part, Lupin still sat across from him, but now the man was completely still; his tired face looking much paler than usual, almost bordering on green.

"Well, that went well. Don't you think so Lupin?" Severus asked with false sincerity.

His child was relaxing once more, his outburst and subsequent tears having drained him of his remaining energy.

"You adopted him?" The man whispered, just barely audible even to Severus.

"I love him," Severus said more easily than he would have thought possible, considering the random mix of company he found himself in front of.

For those who knew Severus Snape, the dark man of the dungeons, this voluntary admittance was nothing short of miraculous, and therefore met with varying levels of shock. Conversely, Minerva and Poppy fought valiantly to hide their smiles behind their hands, only to be met with scowls from the man sitting between them.

…

Poppy knew that she needed to start the meeting before it degenerated any farther. She quickly slipped into professional mode and finished the introductions.

"What we have before us, ladies and gentlemen, is a very grave situation indeed. Before the holiday season ended, a similar such meeting occurred between myself and the four heads of houses that you see sitting around me. We discovered that over the course of the previous term, no fewer than _eleven_ students, all boys, had disappeared from the various houses here within the walls of the castle."

Nearly half of the room gasped at that announcement, but Poppy held up her hand to stop any questions that might be asked.

"I do wish that you would save your questions until after I have finished laying out the situation," she said with a stern gaze to all those would-be questioners.

"Of those eleven students, only three have returned, and of those three, one is dead, while the other two are currently mentally unstable," she said with a sympathetic glance at Arthur Weasley. The red haired man was staring stoically at the table, unblinking. She had warned him of this part, but he had insisted on sitting through all of it.

"Kingsley Shacklebolt," she said, indicating the tall black man sitting beside Arthur, "has been in charge of the search for the dead child's mother, but as of yet has not found anything conclusive regarding her whereabouts, am I correct?" Poppy said, peering at him.

"While her neighbors have indicated to me that the woman does have a tendency to disappear at random intervals from time to time, they have also admitted that she is typically back by now, if not sooner," Kingsley said in his deep and calming voice. "Mrs. Zabini is nowhere to be found, nor is her current husband. We have notified our contacts in nearby countries, but as of yet, there has been no word," he said, leaning back.

He had not needed to make mention that there was a very real possibility that the woman was dead.

"As for the boy himself, he was only a second year student. Curiously enough, all of the boys, except one, have disappeared in pairs. The boy that initially disappeared with the Zabini boy was none other than Arthur Weasley's youngest son," she said sadly.

She watched as Kingsley laid a hand on Arthur's shoulder in silent support.

"Through a set of very mysterious circumstances, young Mr. Weasley managed to return on his own, but in a decidedly wretched state of being," she said, looking around at all of them. Most of the adults before her looked quite grim, if not altogether lost, as Arthur and Lupin both looked.

"And the third boy?" Kingsley asked curiously.

"Appeared at random this morning, naked, disheveled and nearly mute," she said, feeling her stomach twisting once again.

"That leaves eight boys to still be accounted for," she said grimly.

 _Half of which are Slytherins,_ she thought, looking warily at Severus to see how he was holding up under the strain of the conversation.

The man to her right was still stroking his son's back, but his face was now devoid of color as he listened to her speech.

"Unfortunately, there's more to this than just the missing boys. While doing an autopsy on Mr. Zabini, I discovered something inside him that had obviously been placed there for someone, likely us, to find," she said, holding up the scroll before her.

"It has been charmed to stay fresh," she said with a small grimace. "On it, written in human blood, reads the words, ' _Fless = Flesh_ ," she said, finally sitting back in her chair. "You may ask your questions now, but I can't promise that I will have any answers for you."

There was another moment of shocked silence before the chaotic hubbub began.

…

 _Of course they wanted to know why Dumbledore was not involved,_ Minerva thought painfully, involuntarily thinking back on her nightmare.

"As of late, he has proved untrustworthy," she said, knowing that as one of Albus's oldest friends, her lack of faith would carry greater meaning than any others.

She glanced at Severus warily, remembering his outburst from their previous meeting.

"May I Severus?" She asked gently.

She watched the dark eyed man glance down at the boy fast asleep against his chest, before giving her a curt nod.

"Two of the major problems we have with him both relate in various ways to both Severus and his son Lee," she said, looking directly at Lupin for a moment before moving on.

"Albus allowed Lee to stay for many years in an abusive home situation," she said, purposefully being very calm and deliberate with her words.

The healer to her right shifted beside her in response to her words, looking more serious that he had mere moments before.

"He was staying with Lily's own sister, was he not?" Lupin asked incredulously, looking at her challengingly. "I can't imagine that she would hurt her own flesh and blood," he said, shaking his head in consternation.

"Well she _did_ ," Severus hissed at him coldly. "But then again, your imaginations were never too broad, were they," he spat derisively at him.

"How dare you insult Ha—his father like that?" Lupin asked furiously, nearly saying the boy's name again.

"I said nothing about _myself_ , you _dolt_ ," Severus said sarcastically. "But if you are referring to James, you should know that _my_ son does not wish to be associated with that pompous ass in any way whatsoever."

"Of course you would fill his mind with lies and perverted truths," Lupin growled back.

"Gentlemen, please," Poppy said quietly, but strictly.

"Thanks to your traitorous _friend_ ," Severus continued, ignoring the woman to his left, "he never had the chance to know his biological father _at all_. But if you think that I am the one who turned him against James, then you are sorely _mistaken_. Of course, as I remember it, that was your usual state of being, _was it not?_ " He said disdainfully to the increasingly irate man across the table.

" _Gentlemen,_ " Poppy said icily, standing up with her wand out, pointing it first at Severus and then Remus.

"I _will_ have _order_ ," she said crisply. "Do I make _myself_ clear?"

"As clear as the space between Sirius's ears," Severus muttered under his breath, before nodding his assent to the small feisty woman beside him. Remus did the same, and then they were underway once more.

Minerva fought not to snicker at Severus's snarky response, barely managing to keep her face straight, as she began to speak once more.

"As I was saying, the situation with Lee is one of the two major problems we have with Albus as of late. The second problem being related to the castle itself," she said, explaining how the castle begun withdrawing from Albus, and in turn reattaching itself to the Snapes.

"So you can hear the castle speaking to you?" Madam Florensky asked skeptically.

"As can Lee," Severus said. He stared stoically back at her, silently daring the woman to challenge his sanity in front of a room full of witnesses.

"Furthermore," Poppy said, inserting herself in their conversation, "the castle actually possessed Lee once when it had a particularly important message to get across."

The young Madam Florensky scoffed out loud at that announcement, getting a rebuking glare from both Poppy and Severus.

"That is utterly preposterous," the woman said.

"I was _there_ ," Poppy said evenly.

"You are a Hogwarts graduate, are you not?" Minerva asked in the space that followed Poppy's reply.

"Yes, but I don't see—," the woman started to say.

"What house?" Minerva interjected.

"Ravenclaw," the young woman said pointedly.

"Of course! You must have gotten married since your school days, yes?" Filius asked excitedly.

"Yes Professor," the young woman said with a simpering smile.

"As interesting as this all is," Severus said, raising his voice to be heard, "if we cannot keep to the business at hand, I'm going to go put myself and my son to bed," he said.

"Pervert," Lupin said, none too softly.

" _Uh oh_ ," Minerva said softly, as she saw Severus stand quickly, his wand already in hand and pointed at the unfortunate man sitting across from him. Lee was pressed to his right side of his body, encompassed by only one arm now, as he glowered angrily at Lupin.

Before anyone had a chance to react, Poppy had already intervened.

" _Expelliarmus!_ " She said loudly, grabbing both Severus's and Lupin's wands in one fell swoop.

"You two, come with me," she said angrily, spinning on her heel. "Minerva, if you would, please explain to the rest of them about why it was necessary for the castle to possess Lee," she said on her way out the door, followed none too closely by the two gentlemen.

…

Severus found himself in the main infirmary with a furious Poppy and Lupin shortly thereafter, suddenly feeling very young and small, even though he was more than a foot taller than the fiery eyed woman beside him.

"How old are you two, really?" She spat furiously at the two men in front of her. "Lupin, that was completely uncalled for, and I should have let Severus hex you right there, if it wasn't for the overabundance of witnesses. You and your friends got away with far too much when you were in school here and I'm not going to stand for any more of it, understand?" She glared at the tired looking man until he nodded once.

"And _you_ ," she said, turning on Severus, "You will _not_ , under any circumstances, taunt Lupin about anything—especially if it has to do with people who are no longer here to defend themselves," she raised an eyebrow at him. "Do _you_ understand me on this?" She growled out.

Severus nodded.

"We are going to go back in there, and we are going to work together, like _adults_ this time. Lupin, I expect an apology when we reenter the room," she said, walking back towards the meeting room.

"You can't possibly be serious," Lupin said at her retreating backside.

Severus wisely took a step backwards, the little voice in his head cackling madly, if not a little nervously.

 _Well, this should be interesting_ , he thought, readjusting his son higher on his hip.

"I have rarely been more serious in my life, Mr. Lupin," she said, turning and looking darkly at the man.

"The little boy in Severus's arms has been through enough. You shall not insult his father. Lee loves Severus more than anyone in the entire world, and I think I can go out on a limb and say that the emotion is mutual," she said, looking at Severus briefly, yet proudly.

Severus knew that there was a reason he loved Poppy.

"How can you possibly defend a death eater like _Snivellus_?" Lupin spat derisively.

Lee shifted briefly in his arms, and Severus looked down worriedly to see if he had been woken by the vitriol-laced words that Lupin was spewing.

"How can you afford to align yourself against Lee's protector?" She asked coldly. "Or his protector's protector?" she asked; glaring at Lupin like the dragon lady they all secretly knew her to be.

She sniffed disdainfully at him before heading back into the room.

The two men looked at each other coldly in the bitter silence left in her wake.

"Is he sick?" Lupin asked unexpectedly then.

"Fever and nausea," Severus said, looking at the other man warily.

"He's far too thin," Lupin said.

"He's actually put on weight since I began taking care of him," Severus answered, trying to be civil for Poppy's sake.

He shifted the boy back around to his front, wrapping both arms around the child almost as though the child were some kind of oversized teddy bear. He felt his son respond to the added protection of the more familiar position by relaxing even more against him.

"Shall we?" Severus said, waving Lupin back into the room.

He watched as the other man hesitated only a moment before walking forwards.

 _After all,_ Severus thought, _Poppy does still have our wands._


	50. Deciphering

The room that Severus walked back into was decidedly gloomier than the one that he had left.

"Was his body ever recovered?" Kingsley was asking, as he sat down, readjusting the boy against him as he did.

"In fact, it was not," Poppy said vaguely to his left.

_His body wasn't found?_

He was not the only one to perk up at her words, but he at least had the dignity not to lean in towards her excitedly.

 _Morons; exhibitionistic fodder,_ he mentally grumbled to himself.

"So he could still be alive then," Arthur said thoughtfully.

"Possibly," Poppy admitted, without much affirmation in her tone.

"That _possibility,_ as you put it, should not be allowed to detract or distract from the very real situation we have at hand now," Severus interjected with some measure of exasperation at the meeting's lack of progress.

"Thank you Severus," Poppy nodded to him.

"The scroll," Lupin said, "May I see it?"

He took it gingerly, holding onto its edges, before leaning in closer and sniffing it carefully. After a few seconds of careful smelling, the man looked up at them with a look of slight consternation.

"The blood—," the man said, trailing off.

"What of it?" Severus bit out harshly.

"The blood doesn't belong to only person."

"How many?" Severus asked in a slightly more hushed tone.

"At least five," Remus murmured; wincing slightly at the chorus of gasps that came from around the room at his words.

"And Severus," the man continued, looking at him directly.

Severus lifted a questioning eyebrow.

"I do hereby formally apologize for the comments I made earlier," the man said.

There was a split second of silence before Severus answered.

"Accepted."

…

After Lupin's announcement discovery and subsequent apology, the room had begun brainstorming ideas for their next steps towards solving this deathly mystery.

During such time, Lee found himself waking once more, still in his father's warm arms. He didn't care for being sick, but if it meant staying in this position for the rest of his life, he wasn't sure he would be able to turn it down.

He listened to the discussion around the scroll itself and discovered with interest that the scroll had been written in the blood of at least five persons.

"Daddy?"

"Child?" His father looked down at him.

"Are wizards able to do DNA testing on stuff?"

A thoughtful look stole across his father's face, but before the man had a chance to answer, another man a short ways down from them had already begun speaking.

"Not in the same sense that muggles are able to, Lee," the man said.

Lee and Severus both turned towards the man, discovering him to be one of Poppy's healer friends.

"What did you say Michael?" Poppy interjected into their conversation, drawing the room's attention to them.

"Young Lee was asking about the wizarding world's ability to do DNA testing," Healer Michael Turnskell explained.

"I'm sorry," Arthur Weasley said, "but I don't understand how that concept is applicable to the current discussion?"

"It's a way of tracing a person's identity," Turnskell answered thoughtfully.

"Similar to magical signatures in the wizarding world," his father said, looking at him before turning to look sharply at Poppy in slowly dawning comprehension.

"Like the necklace," she said slowly, catching on to his train of thought with a smile.

…

Really, it was an incredibly simple, yet ingenious idea.

 _An idea that_ my _boy allowed us to inadvertently stumble onto,_ Severus thought with pride.

Recording the magical signatures that were present on the note wouldn't let them know who the signers had been, but it would allow them to know how many were involved. In addition, once recorded, they could match those signatures up with other objects owned by the persons in question, if not the persons themselves. Severus's gut feeling was that this was a situation aided, if not actually perpetrated, by some of those within the school itself; thus allowing them to go ahead and begin searching within their very own population, while Kingsley and a few others began working on the outside world.

Having gotten that decided, the group finally conceded to the late hour and adjourned the meeting, not a moment too early in Severus's mind, as he looked down at his son. Before leaving the room, he got his wand back from Poppy, along with a stern warning not to go starting fights in the hallways if he knew what was good for him. He had scowled exasperatedly, but she would not give the wand back until he had promised, even if it was only an extremely half-heartedly expressed acquiescence.

He had made it to the main infirmary itself—empty for once, save Draco—before noticing that someone was trying to get his attention.

"Professor Snape? May I have a word with you?" Healer Turnskell called out, jogging a bit to catch up with them.

Severus sighed and looked at his son, who hadn't yet fallen asleep again. The child smiled a knowing smile up at him and he rolled his eyes, before stopping and turning around.

"Can this not wait until tomorrow?" Severus asked with more than a little annoyance.

"Hello Lee," Turnskell said, looking at the bundle in Severus's arms as though Severus had not even spoken.

"Hi," his son said shyly.

"Severus is a good man, is he not?" The other man asked.

Lee nodded his head excitedly, grinning.

"And he's good to you as well, yes?"

"Always," Lee agreed softly, rubbing the side of his head against Severus's darkly clothed shoulder.

"You were adopted when, Lee? A year ago? Six months? Less than that?" Turnskell asked.

"It was my Christmas present," the child said proudly.

"Seems to me that it was a Christmas present to your father as well," the older man said with a kind smile.

Severus looked down at his son and noted that the boy was smiling up at him in silent agreement. However, the hour was late and Lee's cheeks were still flushed with fever, and Severus found himself wanting to end this and go home.

"If that is all . . ." Severus said, trailing off.

"I wanted to offer any help that I could in further cementing your already positive relationship. In the muggle world, as well as the wizarding one, I work a great deal with families; particularly those who are going through some kind of major change. Even under ideal conditions, a change of this magnitude can be difficult to undergo—for both parties. And as I understand it from Poppy, your situation was anything but ideal," the man said sadly.

 _The nightmares_ , Severus thought abruptly.

He looked at the man in the eye and gently probed his mind, searching for darkness, only to come up empty handed. The man truly wanted to help.

Turnskell nodded knowingly at Severus before tapping his head with one finger.

"I would like to meet with you both sometime in the near future; if nothing else, just to listen quietly as an outside observer," he said, easily moving past the issue of Severus's illegal legilimization.

"How long have you known Poppy?" The boy in his arms interjected weakly.

"Nearly all of my life," the man said, nodding his head towards the boy. "We're cousins."

"Perhaps tomorrow then?" Turnskell asked him.

"Perhaps," Severus said thoughtfully; before turning towards the floo and saying the words that would take them back to their quarters.

…

As it turned out, they were not able to meet with Turnskell until later that weekend. Lee's fever did not break until late Saturday night; leaving them both exhausted Sunday morning.

Severus would not have met with him at all had his son not asked him about it early Sunday afternoon. However, what was done was done, and now he and the boy were sitting on the couch in their quarters, across from the older healer.

"And how are we doing now, Mr. Lee?" The healer asked.

"Better," the child answered with a grin towards Severus. Severus smirked lightly back down at him and squeezed the boy's hand lightly in reply.

"And you Professor Snape?"

 _Ask me_ after _I've slept a full night through,_ he thought tiredly.

"I am fairing adequately," he said out loud.

Turnskell raised a bushy eyebrow of his own, but did not voice an opinion to Severus's answer.

"Is your sleep normally restful when you are well, young Lee?" Turnskell asked instead, changing tactics slightly.

The lad looked up at him, eyes opened widely.

"Not always," the boy admitted after turning his attention back on the older man.

"Nightmares?"

"Yeah," his son said softly, scooting further into Severus's side. Severus released the hand he was holding in order to drape his arm around the child.

"Lee, I want to ask you something personal, and it is okay if you don't want to answer. Do you understand me?" The man asked, looking remarkably relaxed for having asked such a question.

"Sure," the boy whispered.

"Are you ever afraid of losing your father's love?"

Severus wasn't prepared to hear that question. He opened his mouth to object, but Lee beat him to it by nodding briefly, and then hiding his face against Severus's side.

"Child, look at me," Severus said, trying to gently pull his son's face back into the open.

The boy looked up at him long enough for him to see tears gathering in his eyes, and then pushed his face back into his father's side.

"Uncertainty about such a thing is to be expected Professor," Turnskell said softly. "The lad has had no prior examples except for his time spent you this past year. That is hardly enough to prove against a lifetime of bad experiences."

"But I _know_ he loves me," the boy proclaimed then, turning towards the healer.

"Do you know it in your heart?"

The boy wiped away a tear, looking miserably small beside him. His son's lip trembled while he stared resolutely at the floor, avoiding Severus's attempts to catch his attention.

"Lee, let me ask a different question. When do you feel the safest?" Turnskell asked gently.

"When my daddy holds me," the child said, trembling.

Severus felt that there was no other recourse but to pull the boy into his lap, and so he did; hanging onto him tightly while the child's emotions shook through his thin frame.

The older man sat silently across from them while Severus soothed his son back into responsiveness.

"Sweet child," Severus chided his son, stroking his face.

"Don't leave me, please daddy," the boy pleaded with him; his voice regressing back to that of a younger child once more.

"Never," Severus said.

"I promise I'll be good! You'll never have a reason to get mad at me. I'll do what you say. I won't even talk if you don't want me to!" The child babbled frantically at him, in between hysterical sobs.

Severus felt like someone was punching him in the heart at hearing the words pouring out of the boy's mouth. He had to get his son to calm down before he made himself sick again and also so he could try and disperse some of the child's terror.

"LEE!" He said, bringing the boy up to eye level. He put his hands on either side of his son's face and gently forced his child to look at him.

"Look at me Lee," he said in a very commanding, albeit calm, voice.

The boy wavered in his view, but finally managed to hold his father's look. His body shook with sobs, but the sound was dampened as he finally commenced with his babbling promises. His son even put his hands on Severus's shoulders, further steadying their connection.

"You are Lee Cerulean Snape. I am Severus Cerulean Snape. You are my child; I am your father. You. Are. My. Boy. MY _son_ ; MY _child_. You do not have to be some ambiguous form of impossible 'good' for me to love you. You don't have to do anything except be part of my world. You don't have to do anything except _be who you are_. I love you for you. You are _my_ boy," Severus said, pulling his son in against his chest, and resting his head once more on his shoulder.

Now Severus was the one babbling as he held tightly onto the boy; one hand holding the back of his head, while the other rubbed circles into the child's tight and constricted muscles.

"I love you more than Hogwarts. I love you more than potions. I love you more than _Poppy_ ," he whispered insistently into his son's ear.

The boy quivered against him, but relaxed minutely at hearing the last pronouncement.

"I love you more than Quidditch. I love you more than my Slytherins. I love you more than I ever loved your mother," he continued whispering, nearly frantically with an outpouring of emotion more potent than anything he had let loose of in years.

And with each statement, the boy melted farther into his arms, into his chest, into _him_.

He thought that as long as he had admitted this much, he might as well throw in the kicker.

"I love you more than I ever hated your father," he whispered hoarsely. His declaration was met with a small cry in his ear; before his son wrapped his arms more fully around him, choking off the outpouring of memories and words from his father.

How long they sat quietly like that, Severus would never know, but eventually he realized that the arms around him had relaxed, and the lad's breathing had evened out. The child had worn himself out and fallen into an exhausted sleep against him.

It was then that he truly remembered the older man's presence across from them. Severus cursed himself silently, wondering what the man might do with such private information.

He glanced up at Turnskell and was surprised to see silent tears running down the older man's face.

"You will not speak of this with anyone outside of Poppy," Severus said hoarsely.

"I honestly don't foresee a reason to tell even her," the older man said softly.

Severus nodded slowly.

"He's my boy," Severus whispered, feeling horribly exposed.

"Kindred souls, it would seem," Turnskell murmured, finally taking out a handkerchief and wiping his face carefully.

"Professor," Turnskell started, only to be waved off by Severus.

" _Severus,_ " Severus corrected.

"Severus then. In that case, please feel free to call me Michael," Michael Turnskell said with a small smile.

"Severus, I don't know much about your past, but I wonder whether you ever had such a shoulder to cry upon as your son does now," Michael asked seriously.

Severus looked at the boy against him before answering.

"Not to his extent," the potions master admitted reluctantly.

"And certainly not a parent, eh?"

"No."

"How is it then that you are able to do such a good job with the child in your arms?"

Severus didn't particularly want to answer _that_ question, but there was something about this man that he trusted.

"I merely remember what sorts of things I had always wished had been said to me as a child," Severus whispered, not looking up this time. He cleared his throat, seriously discomfited with what he had just admitted.

"It seems that you know more about parenting than some so-called perfect parents then," Michael said, nodding respectfully at him. "You are a good man and a good father," the man continued.

Severus barked a laugh.

"There are many who would argue otherwise, especially to the first part of that statement," he nearly growled.

"I seriously doubt that they could stand up to your son's fiery protestations."

Severus smirked a bit at that.

"How does he sleep at night Severus?"

"Typically his sleep is largely undisturbed, however-," Severus looked away.

"However?" The man prompted.

"His nightmares can be very violent; both to him and to others around him."

"Abuse victims, particularly wizarding ones, are often difficult to reach within their nightmares," Michael said.

"His magic has thrown me across the room more than once," Severus admitted.

"And does it still?"

"The last four times it has not."

Michael Turnskell grinned at that.

"It seems that his unconscious has recognized you as a safe element," the man said.

"Thank Merlin," Severus muttered ruefully, causing the other man to laugh out loud.

"I don't doubt that he has given you quite a ride."

"Then you've seen this kind of behavior in other wizarding children?" Severus asked carefully.

"Most definitely," Michael affirmed with a nod.

Severus nodded back, allowing his relief to show on his face.

"Any suggestions perhaps?"

Michael nodded and detailed a possible plan. Severus and Lee were already doing what it consisted of; the difference would merely be that they would just schedule a bit of every day for it.

"Your son says he feels safest in your lap. So why not allow him to feel some of that safety every day?" The other man posed to him.

"For example, what if you held him every night for fifteen minutes before bed? It might help ease his way into slumber as well, but the idea is that it is something that he can expect, that he doesn't have to ask for. It would just be time for the two of you together, without needing to be prompted by any kind of emotional outburst."

"Allowing him to not only associate emotional extremes with me," Severus murmured, catching on to the idea.

Michael inclined his head with a nod towards Severus, granting him a smile in the process.

Severus looked at the child still draped across the front of his chest, and leaned his head to the side so that he was once more touching the boy's head with his cheek. What the man had suggested wasn't really that hard.

 _And if it would help my son_ , his brain thought distantly, _it would be worth it_.

Thus, the plan was agreed upon.

…

That night, there were two second year students sleeping in the infirmary: Draco Malfoy, but also Neville Longbottom. Given Neville's reluctance to leave the blond haired boy's side, and McGonagall's hesitance in allowing him back into Gryffindor, it was suggested by Poppy that the boy sleep in the infirmary for a few nights. It certainly wasn't any worse an experience than sleeping in McGonagall's transfigured bed, and besides, as Poppy had pointed out: The wards in her domain were much more impressive in strength and acuity.

Poppy gave both boys a dose of dreamless sleep that night. Neville had mentioned his dreams to her in passing, sometime after arriving with Draco, and she had decided that a dream or nightmare free night might just be what they both needed.

 _Especially Draco,_ she had thought, more than a little haunted by the atypical image of the normally haughty boy's cowed and frightened appearance.

Unfortunately, their presence meant that she could not do the same, but she was intent on at least attempting to sleep that night. The previous weeks had been exhausting, and she strongly doubted things would get better anytime soon.

…

Monday morning eventually arrived, albeit far too early for most. Ten minutes after being awoken by his father, in his own bed even, Lee bounded into the living room with a grin. He presented his father with a morning hug and a kiss shortly thereafter, and was rewarded with a hug of his own. Given that they were eating in the great hall that morning, Lee didn't have much to do other than get his clothes on and find his necessary texts for that day's classes.

On the way out the door, his father called him back.

"Lee? Come back here son," the man said.

"Sir?" He asked; a trifle anxious.

"Your shirt collar is flipped—hold on," the man said, kneeling before him to straighten the ornery collar.

"Oh!" He answered with more than a little relief. Severus looked at him sharply at hearing it, and he found himself blushing. Thankfully, his father said nothing of it, standing back up quickly and putting his hand on the boy's shoulder.

"Come, child," Severus said gently.

He started to respond to the man's instruction, but his actions were interrupted by a thought that abruptly appeared in his mind's eye.

_Lucius, after raping him, making the comment and smiling as he did so: "Lick them. I want to watch you."_

_Miserable, not caring if Lucius saw it, Harry had licked his own come from Lucius's fingers._

And then the fucking bastard and flipped him over and done it again; all while Ron and Hermione were forced to watch from the background of the horrible moment.

…

Severus watched as his son froze before him, eyes distant and focused on something only he could see.

"Lee?"

An anguished cry began making its way out of the child's mouth and he felt the floor beneath his feet buck slightly in response.

 _Oh shit_ , he thought wildly as he realized the boy was likely caught in a flashback of some kind.

His son jerked, and the floor jerked once more in return. Then without warning, the lad crumpled in on himself, and likely would have concussed himself on the floor, had Severus not caught him.

"Oh god no!" The boy cried out in terror, before his hands fell to his chest and began clawing against the cloth and underlying skin there. His actions were ferocious in his attempt to rid himself of whatever stimulus that was plaguing him in his memories.

From their position on the floor, Severus fought against the boy's unusual strength; finally managing to get hold of the boy's wrists and then arms and hands themselves, as he saw that the child had continued driving his nails into his palms after Severus had thwarted his previous self-injurious motions.

"LEE!" Severus called out in a commanding voice to the lad, but Lee's consciousness was not with his father in their quarters that Monday morning. It was caught in the throes of a horrible past that had no right being in the mind of a twelve year old boy.

 _But it is_ , Severus thought furiously against that memory and his other memories of Lucius _fucking_ Malfoy. He was sitting underneath the boy now; the child atop his body, as they both sat on the floor—or rather as Severus sat on the floor and his son fought and bucked against him.

Lee keened with a series of nearly breathless screams; his terror largely overriding his ability to find the necessary breath for his very real and present anguish. Severus was once more forced to restrict the boy's limb movements, as his son began striking his own shins with the sharp edge of his heel. The boy's wild magic was now fueling his motions and it was all Severus could do to keep his hold on the child, let alone get to his wand or the floo. He captured the lad's wildly swinging feet between his legs, crossing his ankles in a safe, yet binding grip. In turn, he crossed his son's arms over his chest, wrapping his arms around the boy in the process and holding him tight against his torso, in what he hoped was a comforting, or at least _safe_ , position.

His son continued throwing his head backwards into Severus's shoulder, but there wasn't much the potions master could do about that, except ride it out and hope it eventually stopped. Under normal circumstances, he would have been able to hold both of the boy's arms with just one of his own, but as he had realized, these were not normal circumstances. He could feel the magic pouring out of the boy, growing as his son's horror grew. He heard the inanimate objects in the room begin rattling and he quickly bit out the final key words to a safety warding spell he had put in place just for something of his magnitude. Instantly the rattling stopped as every inanimate object found itself stuck to the surface it was sitting atop.

In turn, the silence of the room allowed him to hear the castle itself, as a deep rumbling beneath and beyond them began making itself known to their ears.

The silence was altered as his son abruptly screamed out with wild abandon.

 _"YOU FUCKING BASTARD, LUCIUS! GODDAMN YOU, YOU SWORE!"_ The protest was then followed shortly by another. _"YOU BASTARD! NO! HERMIONE! RON! NOOOOOO!"_

The child atop his body howled with heartbreaking ferocity and Severus felt his anger trying to stir up his own wild magic, and he forced himself to bite down with all of his control upon it.

Lee screamed with newfound strength, and Severus heard the echo of it in the corridor outside their quarters as it was amplified by the boy's impressive natural magic.

His son screamed and bucked, howling loudly in distress ridden despair. And once more, Severus felt the rumbling of the castle as it echoed the boy's pain.

"Daddy's here, Lee," Severus began speaking in a loud clear voice, knowing instinctively that there was little he could do other than speak to the child and pray that the boy heard him.

"Your name is Lee Cerulean Snape. I am Severus Cerulean Snape, and you live in my quarters, because you were adopted by me at Christmas. You are my son and I am your father. You are my boy, my child, and you have never disappointed me. I am proud to have you as a son. I swear that I will protect you and avenge this tragedy against your life and person. I love you dearly and should anyone ever touch you in such a way again, I swear they will be handed their head on a platter," he said, speaking directly into the vicinity of his son's ear as the boy's head jerked against him.

He kept up his steady stream of reassurances to the child, even as blood began pouring from the lad's nose, and then later his ears. He hugged the boy tightly to his chest and willed that their hearts be made as one, and that their souls be eternally linked.

"I _cannot_ survive without you son. Please come back to me," he croaked hoarsely against the boy through the dust and dirt that had arisen in the shaking around them.

Severus felt as though he had been crushed by a stampede of centaurs, and then subjected to the Cruciatus curse a few half dozen times afterwards. The necklace he wore still echoed all of the boy's extreme emotions back at him; while being in the lad's direct vicinity seemed to do the same.

They were both streaked with dirt, and their clothes were drenched with sweat and Lee's blood, when it finally all stopped.

Lee gasped loudly one last time, and then collapsed against him, boneless with fatigue, having spent nearly all of himself in his outpouring of emotion. In turn, Severus also slumped back against the wall, barely conscious himself.

"My boy, my son," he muttered out loud to them both.

A short period of time later, he heard the floo activate and heard two sets of footsteps make their way quickly across his floor. He willed his eyes to open, but they refused to respond to him. However, his arms managed to tighten around the precious lump across his chest as the two visitors neared their position.

"Thank Merlin Severus," he heard a woman's voice proclaim somewhere in the distance of his muddled brain.

"It's okay Severus," he heard a man's voice say, very close to them both. "You can let go of him now."

"Mine," Severus answered petulantly, pulling the boy out of the man's hold ever so slightly.

"Poppy?" The man murmured in askance.

"We'll just move them both to his bed. I daresay I'll have no space in the infirmary before too much longer."

"Mine," Severus blindly asserted again.

"Yes son, _yours_ ," Poppy said distantly, laying a cool hand on his forehead.

"Mine," Severus whispered as darkness overtook him and the warm lump still being held protectively within his arms.


	51. That's Just Bloody Odd

Severus drifted calmly through the inky blackness of his unconsciousness for an untold amount of time, before finally opening his eyes to the familiar sight of his own bedroom. He groaned softly as his body made it known to him the level of pain that he was currently in.

_LEE!_

Terror abruptly invaded his senses, pushing away the pain in an effort to allow him to focus on the very serious problem at hand. His boy was no longer lying atop his chest as he had been when Severus had last held him.

As quickly as he could, he looked to his right, and discovered the wide eyed visage of Minerva McGonagall sitting primly, if not a bit haggardly, next to his bedside.

"Lee!" He croaked painfully at her; his desperation turning a would-be question into a frenzied demand.

"Look to your left," she informed him calmly.

He turned his head nearly fast enough to make himself nauseated. The thought was quickly driven out of his mind—and gut—as his eyes alit upon the still form of his son.

"Mine," he whispered.

The pain in his limbs and joints began speaking again as he sought to turn onto his side. His vision darkened alarmingly as he finally managed to achieve his task, gasping heavily as he did so.

His son was so quiet and so still that Severus briefly feared that he might be dead; that is, until his eyes caught the slow movement of the boy's chest; coupled with the small fist that was still gripped covetously in Severus's shirt front.

He carefully raised his right hand in order that he might set it on the much smaller shoulder of his child.

"Mine," he said, mouthing the word silently this time.

Though his physical efforts had been few, they had still exhausted him thoroughly. That, in combination with the pain that had been reawakened following the relief of knowing his son was still alive, made his return to unconsciousness relatively easy, and rather unobtrusive to those few who were watching.

…

His next return to the waking world was significantly easier. He awoke looking directly into the still closed eyes of his son. His hand still rested on the boy's shoulder, and he moved it to gently touch the soft skin of his child's face.

"Severus?"

He heard the voice from behind him, but did not turn to look at its speaker.

"Alive," he answered gruffly.

He heard more than one sigh of relief, but did not bother to waste energy on rolling his eyes. He felt _much_ better, but he didn't know how long that feeling might last.

"Has Lee awoken any?" He asked in a louder voice.

"No," was the tense reply.

"Have you tried to wake him?" Severus asked, incredulity creeping into his tone.

"Of course we have," he heard someone that sounded a great deal like Lupin answer.

"Why is there a werewolf in my personal quarters?" His voice was suddenly filled with ice.

"Severus!" He was admonished by Poppy.

"Well, _it's_ _true,_ " he snarled defiantly, even as he began fighting to put himself in a sitting position.

He felt Poppy's hand on his shoulder, helping to stabilize him as he pushed himself up against his pillows. Once upright, he waited for the room to stop tilting around him, before turning to his son's prone form and gathering the boy in his arms. He settled the child sideways against his chest, cradling him closely.

"Poppy," he said, looking into the small statured woman's face. "How long has it been since you found the two of us?"

"Nearly twenty-six hours," she said tiredly from where she was perched on the bed beside them. Standing behind her were Minerva and Lupin, the latter staring at him in stony silence.

"Any other student injuries?"

"None fatal, let alone major—thank Merlin," she said with a weak smile. "Looks like you two got the worst brunt of it."

 _Gee,_ _I wonder why_.

He looked down at his boy and prayed that his child would be okay upon waking.

 _Provided he_ did _wake._

He lightly touched his lips to his son's forehead, before sitting back up and addressing the boy.

"Lee," he began simply. "It is time to wake," he added, speaking in a slightly more commanding tone of voice.

It was how he always woke his child, and so it was with little surprise that Lee responded shortly thereafter by opening his eyes and looking up into Severus's face.

"Hi daddy," his boy said sweetly to him, smiling at him.

Something within Severus loosened, and he was reminded once more of why he had adopted this small life, permanently allowing him a place in his heart in turn.

"Poppy, may I have his glasses please?"

She did and soon his boy could see around the room once more—which he did—but only ever so briefly, before looking back up at Severus.

"How in the world did you do that?" Minerva asked, sounding dumbfounded.

"Do what?" Lee asked, looking at him still.

"Apparently they were unable to wake you," Severus responded snidely.

"Did they ask you?" was the boy's innocently voiced response.

"No."

"You were both unconscious!" Lupin sputtered out at them loudly, breaking into their conversation.

Severus and Lee looked at him, raising identical eyebrows as they did so.

"Now that's just bloody odd," Lupin commented, blinking at them in surprise.

Together, Severus and Lee snickered at his response, raising the eyebrows of Minerva and Poppy as they did so.

When they had quieted down, Severus and Lee returned their focus to one another.

"I'm hungry," Lee said quietly to him.

Severus's stomach actually growled in response, and Lee smirked up at him.

"Brat," Severus said, though not unkindly.

However, when he made to get them off the bed, they were stopped by two rather formidable women standing in their way.

"And where do you think you two are going?" Poppy demanded.

"Food," they answered in unison; Severus's deep voice tempered by his son's lighter alto.

He watched as Poppy glanced sideways at Minerva.

"Has it not occurred to you that you've just been unconscious for more than a day? Not to mention the fact that your unconscious state was caused by an enormous burst of wild magic that was strong enough to literally rock the castle itself?"

They stared blankly at her.

"Well?" Minerva demanded, adding her glowering countenance to the showdown.

"Food!" They answered in unison once more, before bursting into laughter.

"I will not have you leaving this bed for at least another twelve hours!" Poppy told them tersely.

"Aww, let 'em get up!" Boomed a new voice from their living/dining room.

Severus looked at his son in confusion, as the boy looked back up at him in obvious surprise.

"Wasn't that-?" The boy began.

"Jimmy?" Severus finished.

"Who the hell is Jimmy?" Lupin asked, finally rejoining the conversation.

"The castle," Minerva informed him, tiredly.

"Come on Lee! Bring your dad too!" Jimmy boomed out loud once again, his voice still coming from the other room.

Lee slipped out of his grasp and through the two women, even before he had managed to make it to his feet.

"Hold on son," he called out worriedly.

"Come on Dad!" Lee said excitedly, holding out a smaller hand to his large one.

Standing was no easy feat; making him acknowledge the fact that Poppy had likely known what she was talking about. However, he pushed past the dizziness that threatened to pull him back down, and reached out and grabbed his son's hand instead.

They made it down the hallway, the others trailing behind them; stopping only as they came in sight of their visitor.

Severus stopped, completely dumbfounded by the sight before him. In turn, he reflexively pushed his son behind him, lest the situation turn dangerous.

Before him, at the table, sat a human-like figure, with what seemed to be an amused expression upon its face.

…

Draco Malfoy was asleep finally, thanks in part to the heavy dose of dreamless sleep that had been administered by Poppy before she had left to check on Severus and Lee.

He was also no longer in the main corridor of the infirmary, after having become wildly agitated at the slightest unfamiliar noise. Interestingly enough, Neville was still with him. Perhaps the Gryffindor dorms would be safe enough, given the fact that Dean was the only 2nd year boy still sleeping there, but no one was taking any chances this time.

Neville pondered all of this as he struggled to find the attention necessary to study his texts for the week. It seemed odd that they had all wound up in different spots.

 _Even Seamus_ , he thought with a gulp.

He had heard that the boy's body had not been found, and secretly believed that his classmate was still alive somewhere.

_Although after all he's been through, I wonder how he's fairing in the head._

He had never cared for Malfoy, but after seeing him naked and trembling, he was hard pressed to think of the boy in the same way. It was almost as though he had become a different person.

…

Down another hallway, in another room of the infirmary, Ron Weasley was awake and staring at the ceiling in a rare moment of lucidity.

He had been shocked to awake and find his mum sitting asleep in a chair, looking so haggard and pale. He had wanted to speak with her, but he didn't even know if he could. There was a young woman sitting on the other side of the room that looked like a healer of some kind, but he wasn't sure. His body ached in a number of different ways; making him wonder what had happened in the past—weeks? He wasn't sure. All he remembered was looking at Blaise and wanting to make love to him.

 _No, you wanted to fuck him_ , a voice in his head accused him nastily.

He blinked in surprise after realizing the voice was right. It had nothing to do with love and everything to do with _want_ , he realized shamefully. Well, as usual, it looked like he, Ronald Weasley, had royally fucked everything up.

 _And Harry_ —he thought with a start. Merlin! He had touched, no— _grabbed_ —his best mate by the—by the—he squeezed his eyes shut, completely mortified by what memories were resurfacing.

He let out a low moan of sorrow and regret, inadvertently waking his mum in the process.

"Good morning my sweet baby," she said to him.

"Mum!" He cried out to her hoarsely.

"Yes, my sweet baby. That's very good," she said in a soothing voice while stroking his hair lightly.

He opened his mouth to say more, but he felt his throat constrict in shame. He turned away from her bright countenance, tears gathering heavily in his eyes.

"Dear baby boy! What has upset you this morning?" She crooned away at him, obviously not expecting an answer.

Ron tried again to speak, pushing past his throat's obstruction forcefully.

"Am . . .," he bit out, " _sorry_ ," he said painfully, unwilling to look her in the eyes.

Molly Weasley looked down at her son in surprise at the coherent thought she had just heard.

"I am too, my sweet boy," she responded heavily a moment later, her fingers still stoking his hair softly.

He risked a look up at her and saw without much surprise that she was crying as well.

"So . . . _sorry_ ," he tried again, speaking in not much more than a strangled whisper. " _Harry,_ " he ground out in anguish to her. " _Harry!"_

There was so much he wanted to say to her, to explain, but mostly just to start trying to _make right_. Was such a thing even possible? He was such a fuck up; only twelve and he'd already fucked up his life. Well, that was just grand, wasn't it. He couldn't just fuck up like normal people; no he had to fuck up in _style_.

"Sorry Harry, _sorry_ _Harry_ ," he cried, his body trying unsuccessfully to curl up into a fetal position against the restraints.

"Tell him!" He looked at her suddenly, his eyes wide. "Tell Harry! Tell sorry!" He cried out to her pitifully.

His mother looked down at him in sadness, but also in hesitancy at his request.

"Please!" He begged before breaking down completely in sobs.

He was the worst creation of that horrible day with the Malfoys. The memories themselves were heinous enough, but he had taken it one step further and—and what, ruined a life? And where was Blaise? And Hermione?

Without noticing it, he had begun trembling violently. What had he done? He moaned again in an effort to let out some of the swirling emotions currently threatening to topple him once more down into the darkness.

 _What had he done?_ The phrase began pounding into his mind like an accusatory mantra. More importantly, and what was even worse than hearing the revolution of the question reverberating through his consciousness, was the very real knowledge that _he didn't know!—_ at least, not completely.

Abruptly, Lucius Malfoy's words came to him: _"I don't give a damn if you pass out; either way, I'm going to fuck you until I can feel the pull of your entrails against my dick._ "

Unlike the last time his brain had recalled those words, he did not begin vomiting violently at remembering the man's horrible statement. Rather, in some horrible sense, he felt almost deserving of the punishment that he had been meted.

 _But not Harry, not Blaise_ , he thought nonsensically. They had gotten the same treatment and hadn't deserved it whatsoever.

His mum!

"Mum!" He turned back to her, his body still shaking violently, but his eyes still clear.

"Ron, what is it?" She asked worriedly, reacting to the change in his tone.

"Malfoy!"

"Draco or Lucius?"

"Both!" He sobbed, unwilling to think of what Draco had done. _Unwilling_. _Unwilling_.

 _Snape_ ; _Snape found me and helped me and never told anyone_.

He was _such_ an ass. Why couldn't he have gotten past his _stupid, worthless_ pride and thanked the Potion's master?

"Tell Snape thanks!" He gasped out, his mind jumping tracks quickly once more.

His mum clearly didn't understand, but she nodded her head in acquiescence to the odd requests nonetheless.

"And the Malfoys?" She ventured hesitantly to him.

Instantly, as though a switch had been flipped, Ron's body went still, and his tears stopped their wild progressions down his cheeks.

He whispered a response too low for his mum to hear, forcing her to lean in closer and ask him to repeat it.

When her head was right next to his mouth, he spoke his words once more.

"Kill them."

…

From where he was standing behind his father, Lee couldn't see what had shocked the man so, but he was willing to find out. He poked his head out to the Potion Master's side and stared at amazement at what he saw sitting at their table.

Its shape was human, but it clearly _wasn't_. For one thing, it wore no clothes, and while it did have various features—such as lips and a nose—there were no color differentiations among those features. Its body was nearly monochrome in color, except where the shadows wove their own differences.

Moreover, its body had two arms and two legs—complete with a head and a face—more or less—but instead of being made of flesh and blood, the creature before them appeared to be made out of sand and _gravel_.

_Rock Father._

The phrase from his memories abruptly inserted itself in his mind.

_Are you his pebble?_

Rock; sand; dirt; those were the components that Jimmy had talked about being made from!

"Jimmy?" Lee asked hesitantly from where he stood, still mostly behind his father's darkly clothed figure.

His father grasped his arm worriedly; seemingly prepared to force him back protectively behind his larger form, but before he had completed his movement, the creature before them had begun laughing.

"You're right Severus," the person-like figure before them said in a loud voice, "he's a smart boy." The figure appeared to be smiling, but it had no discernable teeth, let alone an oral cavity.

"What _have_ you done to yourself?" Lee asked in confusion.

"I'm still me," the possible Jimmy figure before them said, crossing its arms defensively.

"But you aren't," Lee said in confusion.

"If you really _are_ Jimmy," Severus said, interjecting quickly, "then you should still be able to speak in our heads, as before," his father pointed out carefully.

The figure smiled its sandy brown shaped grin once more, before responding to Severus's challenge.

" _Okay little dude, do you believe me now?_ " Lee abruptly heard inside his mind.

"Dad!" He exclaimed, pulling on his father's arm to turn him around.

"Did you hear him?"

"I did," his father said, with a thoughtful nod.

"Will someone please explain what's going on?" McGonagall exclaimed, startling them both.

Lee had forgotten that the others were still there, but now that he had remembered, he could see them standing quietly at the edges of his peripheral vision.

"Ah, Professor McGonagall," Jimmy turned his quasi-body towards her with jerky motions. "I've always wanted to speak with you one on one," he said, smiling that flat smile once more.

"Have you now," McGonagall clucked at him disbelievingly.

"Always," Jimmy said, repeating himself earnestly, before falling silent and going completely still.

"Jimmy?" Lee asked in concern.

Jimmy didn't move, but Severus did; pulling Lee closer to him in the nerve-wracking silence that was Jimmy's sudden halt in motions.

And then, everything seemed to come back together as the figure shook itself a little, before turning in the direction of Poppy.

"Something has just come to my attention in the infirmary," Jimmy said to the healer; this time speaking in a much more serious voice.

"Danger?" Severus asked tensely, settling his hands on Lee's shoulders protectively.

"More of a revelation of sorts, from young Mr. Weasley," Jimmy answered curiously, staring at them blankly.

Poppy's stance snapped into one of business as she strode past Lee and his father, moving at a surprisingly quick pace, considering her diminutive stature.

Only seconds later, they watched McGonagall follow suit, muttering something about Mr. Weasley still being a part of her house no matter what his mental condition was or was not.

"Then perhaps I should go as well," Lupin said in the silence that followed the exit of the two older women.

"I'd rather you not," Jimmy said pointedly, the shadows around his "face" becoming darker as the lines deepened themselves.

"Dad?" Lee asked shakily as they witnessed the beginnings of an angry Jimmy making his way into the conversation.

Regardless of the fact that Jimmy's attention was clearly elsewhere, Severus still pulled Lee far out of his path as he stalked towards Lupin. Lee and his father turned and watched from a safe distance as Jimmy closed the distance between himself and the rapidly paling man.

"And why's that?" Lupin asked in clear nervousness.

"You've needed someone to give you a talking to for some time now; guess I'm just the only one willing to do it."

"If you haven't noticed, I _am_ an adult now," Lupin said, barking a sound that might have sounded like laughter under other circumstances.

" _None_ of you are adults, as far as I can tell," Jimmy said very seriously. "Except maybe Severus and those two women who were just here," he continued on menacingly.

"You call _Severus_ an adult?" Lupin exclaimed incredulously, making that rough barking sound again.

Lee felt anger over that quip, but the still presence of his father behind him quelled the urge to do something about it.

"After all that he's been through? After all that you and your friends put him through?" Jimmy said, taking a step closer for every indignant question.

"After all that _you_ put him through? Damn it Remus, yes; Severus is most _certainly_ an adult, and he found his way to that status much faster thanks in part to your actions."

Lee stared at them in confusion, before looking back up at Severus as his father's hands tightened spasmodically on his shoulders. His daddy's face looked very tight and drawn, and his eyes were strangely unfocused, staring intently at something only he could see.

"Look," Lupin said, raising his hands in an effort to separate himself from what was going on around him. "I don't know who or _what_ you are, but I don't have to listen to you badmouth the only people who ever gave a damn about me."

Severus's grip tightened once more on Lee's shoulders, and surprise skittered through Lee's limbs. And _then_ his father did something completely unexpected! He leant over and just picked him up(!); turning him around so that they were chest to chest once more, just like he did when Lee was upset.

 _But I'm not upset_ , Lee thought to himself in slight confusion.

His daddy's arms tightened around him more securely before he started making his way (and Lee's) to the table. He sat down with his back to the other two in the room and then hung tightly onto Lee as though _he_ were suddenly _his_ father's lifeline.

From behind him, a scene of which Lee now had the perfect view of, he saw Jimmy continue to advance on Lupin; his arm outstretched as though to touch him.

"You may be happy with your continued ignorance and biased prejudices," Jimmy said in a very tired sounding voice, "but I no longer can bear to put up with such idiocy. If you can't be made to see reason, then I shall _make_ you."

"What are you-?" Lupin started to say, before being rushed by the figure before him.

And still, Severus said nothing; only now, his silence was tempered by soft caresses to Lee's head and back; gestures that always melted him from the inside-out, leaving his ability to focus on anything other than his father's ministrations rather limited.

Distantly he became aware of an odd strangled grimace, followed by a low crying out and a loud thump.

As he found himself being lulled to relaxed safety by the insistent comforting caresses of his father's fingers, he also found himself being filled with a strange apathy towards anything outside the two of them. This feeling was increased when his father surreptitiously threw up a silencing spell; completely blocking all aural noise from the scene unfolding behind them.

Lee could see Jimmy touching Lupin's arm, and he could see the terror filled gaze that Lupin had fixed stupidly on the floor, but he was unable to discern what it all meant together; especially as his father lulled him into a languid state not much unlike the unconsciousness he had not too recently still been a part of.

Food no longer seemed important as the heat from his father's lean torso seeped into his muscles and flesh. This contact, this safe feeling of _completeness_ that was achieved when his father held him protectively like this, was all he ever had really wanted; and now to get it, without his even having _asked_ for it—directly or indirectly—well it was a little too much to bother worrying about, really.

In his quickly deteriorating awareness, he noted that Severus had transfigured the chair into something more resembling a recliner. He took advantage of the more relaxed position by snugging his legs and feet up against his father's sides. He also moved his arms out from behind Severus's head and wrapped them more securely around his back proper. From there, he nestled his head and face in the man's neck and shoulder, hugging him fiercely all the while. It seemed ironic to him that although Severus had made a big deal about his needing to learn the ability to ask for things that he needed, it seemed that Severus himself was unable to do the same.

No matter. Besides, he was a boy— _Severus's boy_ —his mind quipped, and Severus was a man; a man who only seemed to have his best interests at heart. He knew that he was completely safe in this position. He knew that Lucius would not be allowed to hurt him or even come near him like this. He knew that his daddy loved him more than anything else in the world.

Beyond that, what was there to worry about?


	52. You Want ME to Give YOU a Second Chance?

Severus had his boy. He also had his memories of the man who currently lay mewling inarticulately in the floor following Jimmy's announcement that he was going to force him to see past his biases. Their initial parting had not been pleasant all of those years ago, but Severus's only regret was that he had not kicked him out sooner.

 _Or just kicked him in general_ , his mind supplied pointedly.

He shook his head with the thought; what done was done and no amount of thinking—wishful or otherwise—would change that fact.

He leaned back in the armchair he had transfigured the regular straight backed chair into and closed his eyes wearily, silently bidding his subconscious to focus on the more pleasant of his memories for once.

He and his boy were as one once more as they sat quietly together that morning. Severus found his thoughts sliding back to their past Christmas, and he felt his chest cavity fill with warmth at the remembrance of that experience and its subsequent revelations.

Abruptly he turned his mouth closer to the ear of his child and whispered something that he had wanted to say ever since Lupin had reappeared in his life.

"We won't let them get away with hurting us," he whispered to the small figure laid out against him. "We will show them that a Snape is a force to be reckoned with."

. . .

Remus Lupin was trapped in another entity's nightmarish memories. Who were these monsters and what gave them the right to hurt the castle's children?

He gasped aloud as he recognized one of the children before him as none other than his best friend's son, Harry. The boy was inside a room somewhere in the castle with two other children—a boy and a girl—where he was being taunted by none other than the blond haired menacing figure of Lucius Malfoy.

And then Remus felt a peculiar sensation as his insides froze, contrasting sharply with the feel of his blood boiling inside his very veins. Had the sight of what Lucius was doing to the child actually happened?

Sweet Merlin; he _knew_ that it was the truth, and before long, he found himself crying with Harry as the boy was taken apart before his very eyes.

Soon the scene had changed as he began to watch image after image of Severus Snape interacting with—and even _protecting_ and _comforting_ —the child of the man's most hated nemesis. He was confronted with unending flashes of evidence towards Severus's love for the boy, and also Harry's—or rather it was Lee now, wasn't it?—reactions in turn.

The unending parade of images finally began to subside and he saw himself in the conference room, openly deriding Severus's abilities as a father to the entire room itself.

Time sped up again then, but this time it moved in the _opposite_ direction, dumping him back in his—in _their_ —school days. He saw the many pranks that they played against Severus, some of which he had remembered, but also many that he had not.

At the end of it all, he finally found himself looking into a broken and torn up classroom. In the middle he saw the teenage versions of James and Sirius standing in front of the kneeling figure of a miserable looking and tightly bound Severus Snape.

One muttered spell by Sirius only moments later and he saw that Severus's clothes had been torn away and thrown into a heap in the corner of the room.

"So _pretty_ ," James oozed at the pale faced boy bound before him. Remus saw James slip a hand into the waistband of his own pants, where he could easily make out the outline of a hard cock straining against the material.

"Don't you think so Sirius?" James asked; his hand still in his pants. Although Remus was watching them both, he still heard the unmistakable sound of a distressed groan escape Severus's lips at the boy's casually spoken words.

"Looks a bit hungry to me, James," Sirius answered, pulling his clothes open to reveal his own hard cock.

"I think he'll feel better if we fill him up," Sirius continued, his eyes glittering in a foul way.

"Open up _Snivellus_ ," James said, putting his fingers on the side of Severus's face in a way that suggested violence should the other teenager disobey him.

"Have you _no_ sense of decency at all?" Severus spat out at them.

"Oh we Marauders believe in fair play all right," Sirius answered with a frightening grin. "If you're willing to go down on _Remus_ , then you ought to do it for all of us. Isn't that right James?"

"Most certainly," the other Gryffindor said with a sly grin.

"I think we should take you from behind, just as you did with _our_ friend the night before last," Sirius added.

"Oh Sev, oh Sev," James gasped out in a poor imitation of Remus's desperate tones from the aforementioned evening.

"Please, I _need_ you _in_ me!" Sirius said, joining in with a cruel laugh.

Remus closed his eyes and looked away Sirius and James began kicking the hapless young teen in front of them. He didn't want to see this. He _really_ didn't want to see this at all.

He had thought that Severus had broken it off with him because of his inability to publicly stand up for the Slytherin boy against his friends.

He hadn't known that the plot had been _much_ darker than that.

He closed his eyes and put his fingers in his ears, but the Slytherin teen's screams still managed to cut through into his head.

And then—much later—after Sirius and James had tired of their play toy and left Severus to bleed quietly in a puddle of filth and cooling ejaculation, Remus finally unstopped his ears, opened his eyes and _made_ himself look at the aftermath of his friends' harsh cruelty.

Somewhere in there, he noted, Severus had been released from his bonds, but that was the only kindness they had allowed him.

 _And maybe it wasn't a kindness at all,_ his mind realized as it flashed back to Lucius and Harry. Lucius had allowed Harry to fight back—some—but really it had only been a ploy to further instill the sense of the boy's guilt and hatred of _himself_ for supposedly being _weak_ in the face of such overwhelming odds.

He watched with a sick feeling as Severus began vomiting upon the already sullied floor before him.

Following the episode of his sickness, after Severus's eyes had finally opened again, Remus found himself taken aback at the utterly dead look in his long past ex-lover's face.

It was that look that remained with him after he had opened his eyes and found himself still in Severus's quarters, only now curled up in a fetal position on the floor. Jimmy—or the castle, or whatever that creature had been—was nowhere to be found, but it seemed not to matter any longer. The message had been delivered and received and now Remus was aware of much more than he had ever desired to know.

He was surprised to see that the area around him was mess free. He had certainly felt as though he had been sicking up before, but perhaps the castle had taken care of that. He felt it unlikely that Severus might have done anything for him.

 _Really, Severus has no good reason to help me whatsoever_.

He shakily sat up, only to immediately lean his head back against the stone wall behind him; closing his eyes as a wave of nauseating unease passed painfully through him. He tried to breathe deeply; reminding him heavily of how he always had to breathe in the morning that followed the aftermath of his monthly transformations.

Still in that quiet resting position, he sought to make sense of the knowledge that had been thrust into his mind that morning. So much had been revealed to him, changing his knowledge of the people and the situations that had occurred to them; which in turn enhanced the nausea that came from his being off-balance.

It was a truly epic sized paradigm shift that he had just been slapped in the face. It was no wonder that his mind and body were still reeling from it.

He finally managed to open his eyes, largely because of the increasing fear that came from not knowing Severus's whereabouts.

. . .

Molly had nearly assaulted Poppy and Minerva upon their arrival in the infirmary following the castle's announcement that something was going on there. Poppy had to threaten the woman with a calming potion before Molly had slowed down enough for them to understand her words.

And even then, the message she was trying to get across to them didn't make much sense.

Apparently Ron had been lucid that morning, and had attempted to get several messages across to her. And now Molly wanted answers to questions that neither Poppy nor Minerva could help her with.

"What did Ron do to Harry that he felt such a need to apologize for? What did Severus do to cause Ron to be so indebted to him? And for Merlin's sake, why on earth would my baby boy tell me that we ought to kill the Malfoys?" Molly asked them frantically.

Poppy had her suspicions on who might be able to answer them, but these were not simply everyday discussion topics. It was questionable whether or not it was worth it to interrogate those certain people in order to help Molly find the truths that she was so very desperate to know the answers to.

. . .

Severus awoke with the feeling that someone was watching him. Turning his head slightly, he soon understood why.

"Lupin. Why the hell are you still here?" He demanded quietly, taking care not to wake the small warm lump of boy who was still asleep on his chest.

The man was sitting on his couch, staring at them with a wide-eyed look of astonishment. However, now that Severus was awake, his face quickly changed into a look of sorrow.

 _Finally caught on did you?_ He thought with an angry edge to his mind.

"Do us both a favor, _Lupin,_ and do not bother to apologize," Severus said in a very deadly voice.

"I never knew," Lupin said with a bewildered and somewhat pitiful face.

"You never wanted to," Severus bit out. He swallowed heavily to fight off his sudden overwhelming urge to hex this man— _this stupid, blind man_ , he raged mentally.

"Leave us Lupin; before I am forced to do something unpleasant," Severus said with a piercing glare.

Thankfully the other man actually listened for once; his eyes still more blank than not, as he stood up and walked himself to the door.

Unsurprisingly to Severus—whose paranoia knew no bounds—Lupin stopped at his doorway and turned to look at him just prior to exiting.

"I am though—sorry, that is." He said in a low voice.

Severus didn't bother asking him for what.

It didn't really matter either way.

" _Leave_ , Lupin. You are dangerously close to overstaying your welcome; little though there was to begin with."

The other man looked at him blankly for another moment before Severus's words finally seemed to register, eliciting a silent nod. Then Lupin turned around and left him—them— _once again_ , his subconscious added on with an almost indistinct whisper.

That just showed what his subconscious knew, then. He looked down at his chest and lap where his own small boy was still curled up tightly against him, asleep.

Severus didn't believe in luck, but even if he had, he wouldn't have believed in the concept of _good_ luck. Look at what his boy had been put through already in his very young life; hell, Severus wasn't all _that_ old, and yet he had already experienced enough pain for ten men.

 _Some of us just aren't meant to be happy,_ was the morose thought that came across his mind. It was followed shortly thereafter with a mental kick as he realized what he had been thinking.

The situations weren't any better than they had ever been, but now he had a chance to at least make it better for _someone_ else. He looked down at his boy and smiled; only to be surprised when the boy looked back, a smile also upon his face.

. . .

"You know, don't you," Minerva said to Poppy later that day in the infirmary. "You understood about those questions that Molly was asking us about earlier, didn't you." Minerva's voice was soft, and when Poppy turned to look at her, she was surprised to also see a sympathetic look in the older woman's eyes.

"I only have a hunch about who might know," she answered vaguely.

"But?" Minerva looked at her searchingly.

"I doubt that the process of discovering the answers will be an easy one for either group involved."

"Learning to survive rarely is," Minerva said after a quiet moment.

"Indeed," Poppy answered, raising an eyebrow of surprise at the other woman.

. . .

It was in the week following his flashback that Lee and Severus began sitting together in the evenings, approximately fifteen or twenty minutes prior to Lee's bedtime. At first they spent that time together in complete silence; pressed against one another chest to chest as tightly as Lee could manage. Lee kept his nose buried against Severus's neck the entire time, while Severus held him back just as tightly until it was time for the boy to go to bed.

Jimmy thought it intriguing that they were _both_ noticeably clingy towards one another that week. Luckily for Severus's reputation, Lee's feelings were displayed a great deal more overtly than his father's.

It was also during that time that Poppy finally reached the end of her rope with Molly's endless questions, and told her—in an exasperated tone—that if she really wanted to find the answers to her inquiries, then she'd do better to ask the involved parties themselves.

Surprisingly, Molly _did_ contact Severus, and even more flabbergasting for both Poppy _and_ Molly, Severus agreed that she could meet with him and his son—although he did take the time to warn her that they wouldn't necessarily agree to give her any answers.

It had to be good enough for Molly.

. . .

The meeting took place in the infirmary's conference room, even though Poppy had offered up her office as an option. Severus had felt that the conference room allowed for a more formal arrangement than Poppy's office would have. Molly had not told him exactly what sorts of questions she had for them, but he had a fairly strong hunch that the subjects brought up would not be comfortable for any of them.

When Severus and Lee arrived that afternoon, they discovered that the room's furnishings had once more been tweaked by Jimmy. Gone were the large circular table and multiple squishy armchairs; instead there was a round table of much more moderate proportions, accompanied by three soft backed chairs.

Molly was already there waiting for them, and Severus could clearly see the surprise in her eyes when she saw that were holding hands. Relieved that she had not reacted any more than that, Severus and Lee sat down in the chairs opposite the table from her.

Fearing another confrontation over his son's changed name, Severus headed her off by inquiring as to whether she had been informed as to the latest changes in their relationship.

"I have," Molly said kindly, smiling at Lee in a motherly way. "I am happy that you've found someone for whom you can put your trust in, dear."

Lee gave her a small smile in return, but did not reply.

Molly looked as though she would like to say something else to him, but after taking one look at Severus's stony demeanor, she quickly opted not to.

"As I told your father, Lee," she said carefully, "Ron has been having more lucid moments as of late, and as a result, I now have some messages to pass along to you both." She stopped and a perturbed look came over her face as she thought about how to say her next words.

"These messages have raised several questions for me, and it is my hope that you can help illuminate some of my son's experiences for me, by explaining what they mean."

" _But_ ," Severus interjected, looking first at Molly and then down at his son, "As I told Molly, we shall make our own decisions as to whether or not to explain to her the situations in question."

He watched Lee's face carefully until he got a small nod of understanding in return.

"All right?" Molly asked Severus, and got a nod of her own.

"All right," she said in agreement, before turning her attention back to Lee once more.

"Ron told me to tell you that he is very sorry," she told him in a serious voice.

"And Severus," she turned back to him. "He wanted me to tell you 'thank you.'"

Severus felt his son's body quiver with her short message; prompting him to reach out and take his hand—which, unsurprisingly, was now ice cold.

His own message had not bothered him, but he already knew that he would not be saying anything to her about it. He was a man who stood very firmly by his promises, and since he had promised the youngest Weasley boy never to speak of what had happened, that meant that he would keep the boy's confidence until the day he died.

"Can you tell me why he felt the overwhelming need to say these things to you?" Molly asked them as she was met only with their silence.

"I will not speak for my son, but for my part, I cannot tell you anything, given that I gave him my word that I would not," Severus said stiffly.

He squeezed his son's hand lightly, and was concerned to see the distant look in Lee's eyes that greeted him when the lad turned to look at him.

"Lee?" He asked the boy quietly.

"I don't want to say anything," Lee answered loud enough for Molly to hear from across the table.

Severus looked up at Molly sharply and was relieved when she seemed to accept his words.

"Do you want me to take a message back then, Severus?"

"You may relay this to your son, Molly: You are welcome."

"And Lee?" She asked hopefully. "Don't you have anything to say to Ron? He did say that he was sorry after all. I don't know what the conflict was, but it seems to me that your friendship is strong enough to withstand whatever this is," she stopped and looked entreatingly at him.

When he didn't immediately answer, she rambled on, telling him that she had always enjoyed seeing them together, and now that Ron was starting to have more lucid moments, perhaps it would even do them both some good to see one another.

"No."

Severus and Molly both looked at Lee, who was looking resolutely at the floor.

"No _what_ , dear?" Molly asked.

"I won't see him. You can't make me," he answered in an icy voice. Severus watched as he clenched his teeth tightly; making it clear that he wasn't going to say anything else.

"Lee gave you his answer, Molly. I believe we'll take our leave of you now," Severus said, standing up simultaneously with his son.

"Are you sure that you won't reconsider?" Molly answered in a somewhat desperate voice. She had yet to rise from her chair and was still looking at Lee as though Severus had not spoken.

Lee responded to her words by beginning to tremble, and Severus quickly drew him into an embrace, lest he lose his fragile control over himself. Idly, Severus noticed with some mild surprise that the top of his son's head now reached the middle of his stomach; meaning that the boy was finally starting to grow. He made a mental note to himself to speak to Poppy of it later.

"He has given you his answer Molly," Severus told her snidely. "We are leaving now."

He gathered the still small boy into his arms easily, and made his way out the door to the floo. Lee kept his eyes scrunched and his face pressed into Severus's shoulder the entire way; not even looking up as Severus stepped over the threshold into their quarters.

Back in the infirmary's conference room, Molly continued to sit in the same place she had been when they had left her. Her mind was full of swirling images of her son as he continued his struggle to get better.

Privately she wondered if he ever really would.


	53. Surprising Reactions

"You're going to have to get him back, you know." The old man told the haunted looking man in front of him.

"I know sir," came the cowed answer from the kneeling blond haired man.

"This is _your_ fault," the old man's eyes glinted with a dark light.

"Yes sir," the blond haired man said resignedly.

"Do not make me punish you again, Lucius," the old man warned in a gravelly voice.

The once proud man before him flinched in response, but said nothing more.

. . .

Lee felt as though his emotions were ricocheting around the inside of his body, trying to find a way out of his skin. However, he didn't find a way to express this until after his dad had gotten them back home, and onto the couch.

"I won't!" He choked out angrily into the shoulder of his father. "I won't talk to him and I won't forgive him! She can't make me!"

His father only continued to hold him and stroke his back as he ranted; letting him express his emotions in a way that the Dursleys had never done.

"I will not make you do so either, but you _should_ try and look at the situation from Molly's point of view, son," his dad had finally said after he had fallen silent.

Lee didn't want to understand Molly's feelings or point of view. Look at what Ron had done to him! For that matter, look at Lucius! He had hurt _both_ Lee and his father, and yet the man had completely gotten away with his heinous acts without any punishment whatsoever!

"I want to hurt them. I want them to _hurt_ ," Lee growled at his father. He pulled himself out of Severus's lap and made it to his feet; only to start pacing back and forth across the room.

"Young Mr. Weasley has nearly died on a number of occasions since making his way back to Hogwarts. Not only that, but he has also been in near constant pain the entire time. What else would you like him and his mother to endure before you are willing to forgive him?" Severus asked from his spot on the couch; his eyes continuing to follow Lee as he traversed the room.

"How can you side with him? You _know_ what he did!" Lee yelled in a frustrated voice.

"As I have told you before, I have no desire to see you throw your life away in order to find your revenge!" His father said, only raising his voice slightly.

"What does it matter anyways! Lucius already made me his bloody _fuck toy_!" Lee cried out, his eyes filling with tears as he did so.

"Do you truly believe yourself to be worth nothing more than that?" Severus asked him softly, his eyes cutting Lee straight to his core.

"I don't know anymore," he said, sinking to the floor and putting his arms around his legs. He laughed through his tears, but it was a sound bereft of any humor or joy.

"I don't know if I'm really Harry Potter pretending to be Lee Snape, or just Lee Snape refusing to be Harry Potter. I'm so fucked up," he said, beginning to rock back and forth; his head in his hands. "If you hadn't adopted me, I wouldn't be anything, anyone at all," he rambled softly with his blurred eyes directed at the floor.

His tears were falling freely when Severus joined him there on the ground. His father merely sat next to him in silence, and waited for him to regain some measure of his control over himself. Finally, after his ragged sobs had nearly let up, his dad began moving towards him with a handkerchief in his outstretched hand.

He tried to take it and clean himself up, but the man was having none of it; personally wiping the tear tracks away on his face with far more gentleness than Lee had expected, even after all of this time. After wiping his nose for him, Severus put away the handkerchief, and replaced it with a suddenly conjured glass of water, which he handed to Lee quietly.

Lee took it gratefully, swallowing nearly half of the cool liquid with his first swallow, before drinking the rest of it a more moderate pace. It was only when he was finished with the glass and had handed it back to his father that Severus spoke.

"It doesn't matter whether your name is Harry _or_ Lee, son. Those names ultimately have nothing to do with _who_ you are." His father told him quietly from where he was sitting cross legged beside him.

"Then who am I?" He pleaded quietly to his father.

"Child, you come from here," Severus told him solemnly, placing his own large hand over Lee's heart, calming him somewhat with just his warm touch.

"And from here," he added, putting his other hand on Lee's smaller head. "Your mind and your heart work together to form your character," his father said softly, leaning his head over to look more closely at Lee's eyes.

"What about my memories?" He whispered hoarsely.

"You do not have to let what has happened to you in the past define who you will become in the _future_ ," his dad said emphatically. "It has taken me nearly two decades of my life to learn this, son. I do not want you to waste as much time as I did," his father said softly, taking Lee's smaller hands and holding them between his own.

"Sometimes I just feel like I'm going to explode from all the feelings that are swirling around inside me," Lee admitted quietly.

"At times you will have that sensation," his dad told him patiently. "I do as well. Finding a way to deal with those overwhelming feelings is part of learning how to survive life."

"Will you keep helping me?" Lee asked in what felt like an impossibly tiny and wretched voice.

"I will," Severus told him seriously.

"I'm cold," Lee whispered then, shivering slightly.

His father got to his feet at his words before leaning over to pull his son up into his arms.

"Better?" He whispered into the ear of his boy.

He got a nod in reply, and was rewarded for his efforts when the lad's arms reached out to hug him tightly in return.

. . .

Neville had to admit that he was surprised that both he and Draco Malfoy were still alive after spending more than a week together as constant companions. After waking up and finding Draco sitting on the same bed as he, Neville had not been apart from the other boy for more than a few hours.

It helped that the blond haired boy had not regained his former cocky attitude towards him, but Neville did feel a bit bad for the experiences the other boy had been forced to experience to develop this new demeanor.

 _And now Draco is sleeping in my bed_ , he thought to himself with an odd smile.

Draco had been crawling into his bed about halfway through that first week with him. Madam Pomfrey had been forced to reduce his doses of Dreamless Sleep, because it apparently slowed his emotional healing process—or so he had deduced after overhearing many conversations between her and another healer by the name of "Turnskell."

It seemed that Draco's method of compensating from the terrors of his unconscious mind was by finding a new nighttime protector in Neville.

The irony of the situation did not escape the slightly larger boy.

. . .

When Molly went in to see her son that day, she was met with a surprise. Her baby was sitting up in bed with his restraints nowhere to be seen. Around him stood Turnskell and Poppy, who was currently talking _with_ her son.

 _She's talking with him; not to him!_ Molly thought with unmitigated joy.

However, the best part of her arrival that day was the reaction she got from Ron himself. As she got closer to the bed, he turned _towards_ her with a smile. She nearly gasped with surprise as she realized how much his face looked like it used to—provided that one looked past the shadows under his eyes and the gauntness of his face.

"Mum!" He called out, waving his arms like crazy. She quickly made her way over and kissed his cheek, receiving a weak hug in return.

"As you can see," Turnskell said, after she had stood back up, "he's really started to make progress now."

"Mum!"

She turned back to look at her youngest boy, and was surprised to see a questioning look on his still too haggard looking face.

"Harry?" He asked softly, looking intently at her.

"No visitors yet dear," Poppy said, interjecting before she had a chance to flounder.

"Oh." Ron's face immediately drooped.

"But Professor Snape did tell me to let you know that 'You are welcome,'" Molly said with a questioning look of her own.

"Thanks," her son said quietly, his eyes still downcast.

"Molly, may I have a word with you in the hallway?" Poppy asked quietly once Turnskell had started talking to Ron.

She took a quick look at her son, before nodding.

However, once outside the room, Poppy kept walking, and soon it was evident to Molly that the older woman was taking them back to her office.

"Will he be okay in there?" She asked anxiously.

"Michael Turnskell is one of the best in his field," Poppy said with a reassuring smile.

"And what _is_ his field exactly?"

"Child psychology," was the quiet answer she received.

Oh. Molly thought about that for a minute before making another comment.

"I suppose that Turnskell wasn't able to do much therapy with Ron before, yes?"

"He did a few evaluations, but you are correct," Poppy said in a distracted tone; before waving her to a seat and closing the door.

"What's wrong, Poppy?" Molly asked anxiously. "It feels as though I've been called to the headmaster's office for a prank I didn't commit."

She wanted Poppy to tell her that of course nothing was wrong, and that she was just being paranoid, but neither of those reassurances came from the serious faced woman who was now seated across the desk from her.

Instead, there was a knock on the door.

. . .

Severus was in his office grading papers when he heard someone rap on the outside of his door. Checking his wards, he was somewhat surprised to see that Kingsley Shacklebolt was the one that was standing outside.

Making sure that his wand was close by, he walked over and opened the door slowly.

"Professor Snape? Might I have a word with you?" The big man asked in a deep voice.

Severus nodded and waved the other man in, before closing the door behind him.

"I thought I told you to call me 'Severus,'" he replied with a rare trace of amusement in his voice.

"Really? I don't recall you saying much of anything last time," Kingsley said in a purr. He was standing close enough that Severus could nearly feel his heart beating against his chest.

"Is this a business call?" Severus asked in a bit of a strained voice.

"Technically yes," Kingsley said, pushing Severus back against the wall securely.

"Is it now," Severus stated in a quiet voice. Severus noted that if he pushed his hips forwards just _slightly,_ he could feel the stiff outline of the other man's cock straining against the cloth of his robes. And if he did it again, with a little more force?

Kingsley was now panting heavily in his ear with one hand planted on the wall, while the other roamed down the front of Severus's robes.

It was Severus's turn to gasp as Kingsley's fingers brushed over the front of his pants, where his equally hard cock was begging for attention. Kingsley's fingers quickly found the opening to his pants, undoing the fastenings quickly, before pushing his hand into the other man's boxers.

Severus felt a moan escape his throat as the larger man took his cock in his exquisitely warm fingers and began stroking him.

Feeling a need to regain some kind of control over the situation, Severus grabbed the man's head and pulled it down to his own, touching their lips together desperately. Soon his tongue was in Kingsley's mouth, tasting him, wrestling with the other man's tongue in a strange kind of hot, wet dance. And then he was crying out, and Kingsley moved his head down to his neck, biting down lightly as Severus orgasmed into his hand.

"Severus," Kingsley begged breathily into the slightly smaller man's ear.

Without even bothering to put himself back to rights, Severus quickly slid to his knees, and soon found himself humming around Kingsley's stiff cock. The other part had been pleasurable enough for him, but here he found that he really enjoyed the control he had over his partner's reactions. He moved his tongue back and forth against the underside of the other man's dick, reveling in the moans and gasps that he had caused to erupt from the disciplined mouth above him.

He began to move back and forwards on the length in his mouth, taking a little bit more into his oral cavity with each pass until finally he felt the moist head reach the back of his throat. He backed off for a moment and took a deep breath before repeating the action, finishing it with a _swallow._ He worked his throat around his partner while Kingsley's hands twitched and flexed against his shoulders. And then he growled deeply, knowing it to be a sensation that drove the other man mad.

He heard Kingsley cry out, and shortly thereafter he found himself swallowing down the big man's juices as he erupted inside his throat. He finally pulled himself off of the other man's cock, only to be hauled up forcefully and kissed soundly.

"How was that?" He asked some time later, a bit hoarsely. They had both freshened themselves up and put their clothes back to normal. They were currently sitting side by side behind his desk, hands intertwined.

"Spectacular," Kingsley said, looking at him fondly.

They had been working together for nearly a week now, checking the missing students' magical signatures against those present on the scroll via the belongings they had left behind there at Hogwarts. Likewise, they had also been furtively checking the magical signatures of the missing students' roommates, and as many housemates as they could without drawing attention to themselves.

Unfortunately, they would soon be done with Slytherin, and Kingsley would go on to work with the other house heads.

He had dated Kingsley before, nearly nine years ago, but Kingsley had been forced to break it off when an upper level supervisor had gotten suspicious of having one of his auror's dating an ex-Death Eater—even if said death eater had been reformed.

Kingsley had broken it off mostly out of concern for Severus's welfare, especially when said supervisor tried to blackmail the auror by threatening to rat them both out to The Daily Prophet. It potentially could have turned into a very ugly scenario. Severus knew that it had infuriated his lover, but at the time, with the deaths of Lily and James Potter still so fresh in everyone's minds, they hadn't had any other choice but to do as instructed.

However, since Kingsley was now in a position of great authority, and Voldemort had been gone (more or less) for the past eleven years, they finally had felt the freedom to restart their old relationship. And in fact, this time around was going even better; partially because they were both more mature, but also because Severus's ability to openly express himself had greatly increased ever since the adoption of his son.

"You must come to dinner sometime," he said in a soft voice to Kingsley.

"And meet Lee?"

Severus nodded; his eyes searching the other man's face carefully.

"I would love to," Kingsley told him with a gentle kiss, further putting his anxieties to rest.

. . .

That evening Lee was surprised when his daddy walked through the door with Kingsley Shacklebolt following closely behind. His dad seemed unusually at ease; meaning that they weren't in any kind of danger from the auror.

"Lee, I'd like you to meet Kingsley," his father said easily enough to him.

"It's nice to meet you, sir," he said in a quiet voice, as he shook the other man's hand. He blinked as the auror's hand completely swallowed his own.

_And I thought dad's hands were big!_

Abruptly shy after meeting the big visitor, he went to his father and hid slightly behind him; gently pressing himself into the familiar man's side.

Reassuringly, his felt his father's encircle him with an arm, holding him from where he stood, even as the large man across from them chuckled.

"Don't mind Kingsley, Lee. He is simply surprised that given the choice between the two of us, you find his presence more worrisome than mine. It is not often that way with the other students, you understand," his father said lightly.

He nodded his understanding, but he still didn't leave his daddy's side, not even when it was time for dinner.

"He's not going to hurt you, Lee. I promised you that, remember?" Severus said quietly to him just before it was time to sit down and eat.

He nodded shakily, staring up at his father with trust, even as his stomach did summersaults.

"Would you like to have Lillian with you as you eat dinner?" His dad asked him suddenly.

"Yes please," he answered, brightening somewhat. His snake's presence almost always calmed him; especially when he remembered that she was actually _longer_ than his arm now. Kingsley would have to be nuts to mess with him when he had _her_ wrapped around his shoulders.

 _He'd be nuts to mess with you with Severus in the room anyways_ , his mind tried to tell him as he hurried back to his room to get his snake.

. . .

Severus sat at the table with Kingsley to his left while they waited for Lee to fill the empty chair to his right.

"He does seem much taken with you, Severus," Kingsley said in a very low voice.

"For good reason," Severus answered seriously.

"How much are you going to tell him?"

"How much would you like me to?"

"You might leave out the word 'lover,' for now, Severus," Kingsley said thoughtfully.

"I had fully planned on it."

"How about boyfriend?"

"If all goes well," Severus murmured softly, turning suddenly as he heard his son's light footsteps make their way back into the room, taking a tentative seat to the right of him.

His son's eyes glanced to Kingsley warily, but relaxed somewhat as he looked back at Severus. Severus couldn't help but be inordinately pleased by the reaction, even if it was going to make things more difficult.

Oddly enough, children often seemed to get along well with Kingsley, but the same was hardly true for Severus Snape.

 _But this boy_ —his mind pointed out— _this boy was different_.

Then again, he had realized that very truth back in the hospital wing back before the Christmas holidays.

He chuckled as he saw that his son had chosen to wrap his purple and yellow snake around his shoulders for dinner. He didn't mind the addition of the snake's presence at the table, provided that she made the boy comfortable enough to eat. As he had told the child when he had been sick, Lee was still too underweight to afford to be missing meals. And even though the lad had finally picked up some height, his weight had not gone up nearly as drastically.

. . .

Kingsley didn't even notice the food he was now diligently eating. He was too enamored of the beautiful snake wrapped around his lov—um, _boyfriend's_ son's neck. In turn, the boy—who had previously been known as Harry Potter—kept stealing glances at him as though he were about to reach out and strike him.

The child's reactions to him were clearly linked to a history of abuse, but as of yet, Severus had not told him exactly whom he could blame for such horrors.

"What's your snake's name, Lee?" He asked in a slow and easy going voice.

"Lillian," the boy said in a soft voice after glancing at his father for support.

 _Severus, as a father—the world really_ is _ending._ Kingsley still couldn't get over the insanity of _that_ surprise.

"Good choice," he said in an approving voice, smiling slightly at the small boy.

"Thanks," the child whispered in a barely audible voice.

"Lee is a parselmouth, Kingsley," Severus said brightly, an excited gleam clearly visible in his eyes.

Kingsley's mouth dropped in shock and he was thankful not to have been chewing anything in that moment.

"That's just not fair," he said in an annoyed voice.

"What's not?" The boy asked him, suddenly intrigued enough to ask a question of his own.

"I always wanted to be one when I was a kid," Kingsley explained, somewhat glumly.

"Really? You liked snakes?"

"I _like_ snakes still."

"Is he telling the truth dad?" The boy turned to look imploringly at Severus.

"Indeed he is," Severus answered with a smirk to Kingsley.

"Cool!" Lee said, looking back at him with a new light in his eyes.

. . .

Soon dinner was over—the second half having gone much quicker than the first half—and Severus and Lee were now sitting on the couch, with Kingsley in the armchair closest to Severus.

"Son, I brought Kingsley here tonight for a reason," Severus said, watching his boy's reactions carefully.

"He's your friend, isn't he?" Lee asked inquisitively.

"Indeed," Severus said, reaching to take Lee's hand. "But he's also _more_ than just a friend," he added seriously.

"You're gay?" His child's eyes were wide as he quickly made the mental jump from what his father had told him.

Kingsley suddenly snorted in laughter, causing Severus and Lee to look at him oddly.

"Kingsley," Severus growled.

"I'm sorry," the big man said with a grin towards them both. "I just think 'gay,' and I imagine light-hearted cute little, b-b-bunnies," the man sputtered as he began laughing again—this time with Lee snickering too. The mental image _was_ ridiculous; particularly when paired with the dark clothed scowling Severus that was currently sitting between the two laughing imbeciles.

After they each had received a dark glare from the man in-between them, they finally calmed down enough to let Severus finish explaining the situation to Lee.

"Kingsley and I have been dating for just over a month now, but we have known each other for far longer. I thought it was time you met him," Severus said cautiously.

"So he's your boyfriend?" His son asked curiously.

"Yes," Severus said, even though he despised the word 'boyfriend'.

"Awww," Kingsley said in a way that made him want to slap the other man—if not for the way it made his son giggle.

Once they were under control again, he spoke again.

"Kingsley has even brought you a present, should you two ever manage to control yourselves long enough to get it open," Severus said dryly.

"A present?" That got his son's attention as the boy instantly perked up. "For me?"

"For you," the big man said seriously, before drawing a small box out of his pocket and resizing it.

He handed it to Lee, who took the box with wide eyes. His son didn't open it immediately though, but stared up at Severus instead.

"Is it okay?" He asked softly. Severus wasn't sure if the boy was asking whether it was okay to open it, or whether it was okay as in _safe_ to open it.

"It is. Go on child," he said with a nudge.

Lee opened the box carefully and pulled out a green and orange stuffed dragon, complete with little purple wings.

"It's a wizarding toy, Lee," Kingsley explained. "It'll react to your mind. If you imagine it wandering around chewing on things, it'll do that—although it can't hurt them," he added with a boisterous laugh directed towards Severus.

"How do I start it?" The lad looked at them both with surprise in his face.

"Hug it and say the word, 'Mine," Kingsley said.

"And then give it a name," Severus added.

His son got a thoughtful look on his face before grinning and picking the toy up.

"Mine," he said with a hug around its plush middle.

"Your name is Accomplice," the child added with a grin at Severus.

"Well named," Severus said approvingly, just as the soft toy dragon began to wiggle around.

"Dad! Do you see it?" He called out excitedly.

'Accomplice' stretched itself out before it began wandering over their laps, sticking its nose into their pockets and exploring the couch in general.

"And Lee?" Kingsley said, getting the boy's attention from where it had been riveted at his toy.

"It will grow as you do," the man added with a final grin.

"Oh! Thank you sir! Thank you for the present! It's brilliant," his son said with shining eyes.

"You're welcome," Kingsley said, before fixing a smile on Severus as the boy went back to finding out more about what his toy could do.

Severus nodded his head at the other man, before draping his arm around Lee's shoulders and pulling him in for a small hug.

He was proud that he hadn't even had to prompt the child to thank Kingsley for his present.


	54. I Won't

_**Previously –** _

" _What's wrong, Poppy?" Molly asked anxiously. "It feels as though I've been called to the headmaster's office for a prank I didn't commit."_

_She wanted Poppy to tell her that of course nothing was wrong, and that she was just being paranoid, but neither of those reassurances came from the serious faced woman who was now seated across the desk from her._

_Instead, there was a knock on the door._

. . .

"Could you get that dear? I'm nearly done here." Poppy asked Molly from where she was making tea.

With a small frown, Molly nodded and made her way to the door.

"Arthur!" She exclaimed in surprise, coming face to face with her own dear husband.

Her husband didn't speak, but instead rushed forwards to her; pulling her into his arms tightly. She held on to his strong frame tightly and shook with the fears she was unwilling to allow anyone else to see.

"Shh," he whispered in her ear, stroking her hair lovingly. "Shh. I should have never let you do this alone. He's _our_ son. We can get him through this, but only if we do it together. Shh."

After a few moments, she heard Poppy's voice asking them to please take a seat, and she allowed Arthur to maneuver them into a set of chairs opposite of Poppy. She barely noticed it when Arthur handed her a cup of tea, fixed just the way she liked it.

It had been so _long_ since she had seen Arthur; so _long_ since she had allowed herself to let go of her fears and misery onto someone else—someone she _knew_ was trustworthy. Arthur, for all of his quirks and quiet ways, really was her strength in their more desperate situations.

_How could I have forgotten that?_

She drank some of her tea and then handed it back to her husband to be put down upon Poppy's desk, next to his own. Their hands now free, Arthur put an arm around her and drew up her next to his body; giving her a silent promise that he would help her get through this as much as he could—and then some.

Molly felt tears prick her eyes, but she stoically willed them away. Those could come later, when she knew what they were up against, but for now, she needed to focus.

. . .

Poppy looked at the haggard couple sitting before her with more than a touch of sorrow in her heart. Arthur was practically holding Molly upright as the woman leaned heavily into his side.

Arthur, on the other hand, looked positively dreadful as well. There were dark circles around his eyes, much like his youngest son's, and his skin was nearly gray with fatigue.

Poppy wondered if she was going to have to eventually spike their tea with something to get them to take a rest.

 _Later_ , she promised her mind.

Sighing, she put down her tea as well and looked up at the two Weasleys sadly.

"Now that your son is beginning to interact with the world around him once more, I thought it prudent to mention a few of our findings to you both," she said slowly, watching the couple across from her with more than a little wariness.

"Oh goody. More bad news; just what I always wanted," Molly mumbled against Arthur's side, before be shushed gently by the red haired man.

"I wish I could tell you otherwise, but you are correct, Molly," Poppy said.

"We're ready for it then, Poppy," Arthur said in a level voice.

 _Do you want the bad news or the really bad news first?_ Poppy's mind asked in a sarcastically bitter sounding voice.

"There is no telling whether or not Ronald will ever make a full recovery. Eventually his good days will likely outnumber his bad days, and yes, he might even begin to act like his so-called 'old self' again," she paused, waiting for a response.

"But?"

"When his bad days come, they will likely continue to be very bad indeed. At times, his flashbacks may make it hard for him to delineate between his past and reality as it is now.

"How bad have his flashbacks been?" Arthur asked in an almost whisper.

Here, Poppy exchanged a look with Molly before answering him.

 _Don't give him too many details,_ Molly's look had clearly communicated.

"Bad enough," Poppy said shortly, before being treated to a glare from Arthur.

She stifled her urge to sigh, and thought about how best to explain.

"One particularly traumatic flashback left the child vomiting for several hours. None of the potions or magic used on him did any good until his system was near collapse. At which point, I was able to put him into a restorative coma-like state; allowing us to rehydrate him, which eventually allowed him to recover." She said, explaining the _how_ , but purposely leaving out the _why_.

"What kinds of trauma did he experience when he was missing from Hogwarts?" Arthur asked in a soft voice, piercing her in the heart with the concern she could see within his eyes.

Oh she did not want to answer this question!

"He was raped," she said finally in a flat voice, ignoring the expected twin gasps. "He was raped multiple times, by a multitude of different males; all in the course of only a few days time."

 _Times like this, I despise my job_.

"Did," Molly asked thickly, her eyes no longer fighting the battle to remain open. "Did he know what was happening to him?" She asked, her body visibly trembling.

"From what we know from the actions he has exhibited here, it is likely that he did not know what was happening to him at the time. However," she warned, "now that his mind has regained much of its ability to process information, all that means is that he is now being forced to experience all of these sensations, all of these memories over again _mentally—_ almost as though it were _the first time_."

"Sweet Merlin," Arthur whispered. His eyes were staring at a point on the wall just beside Poppy's head; as his shocked mind fought to understand the implications of her dire words.

Poppy stood up, ready with calming drafts for the both of them, just as Molly fainted. Poppy helped Arthur by levitating her to a bed in a private room, and then with a shrug, spelled him to sleep as well. She enlarged the bed, and then put him down next to his wife. She took off their shoes, and then transfigured their robes into pajamas, before covering them up with blankets.

She knew that they needed their energy if they were going to tackle this thing with any kind of luck at all.

 _Merlin help them,_ she thought wearily, as she dimmed the lights with her wand and warded the door against unwelcome guests.

. . .

Lee was having a very odd dream that night. He was floating underwater, in what he assumed was the lake outside of Hogwarts. He was surrounded by a crowd of merpeople; they were all screaming at him in a high pitched unintelligible garble of nonsense words.

"I don't know, I don't know!" He tried to shout back at them from within the dream, but nothing would come out of his mouth save for bubbles.

Suddenly, one of the bearded men swam forwards and grabbed his arm. It was one of the most peculiar sensations that Lee had ever felt. It was a warm touch, but very rough and not at all gentle. The merman pointed at him, and Lee nodded that he understood. And then the merman pointed to his right (Lee's left) with a furious motion that seemed to mean something important was there.

Lee pointed to himself and then pointed back the same direction.

The merman nodded.

And then he nodded as well.

No sooner had that been established, but the landscape changed once more, and Lee found himself back in the dank hallway where his last nightmare had taken place. It was still as large and forbidding as it had been before, but with a noticeable difference: he could _move_.

Rather uncomfortable now, he shivered a bit and began walking across the floor softly.

He had only made it a few steps when a sound caught his attention.

"Harry!" The voice was a rough whisper, but loud enough in this hallway of dead silence.

He whirled around and saw Ron Weasley standing not two feet from him.

"Get away from me!" He yelled, more angry than frightened.

He saw Ron flinch, but he felt no regret for it. It was bad enough to have had been raped by Lucius, but to think that _his own best mate_ could have committed similar actions against his person!

"I don't need you!" He shouted at the red haired boy.

"I'm sorry Harry!" Ron shouted back pitifully. "Merlin, I'm _so_ sorry," his once friend said, dropping to his knees with his head hung down.

"You think that's all it takes?" Lee was livid now. "You think you can just say sorry and we can go back to the way things were!"

Ron looked up at him with a hopeful look in his face.

"Then you're blind! Maybe you were always blind!" Lee shouted—feeling a deep pain in his chest as he spoke the words that he had wondered about for so very long.

"I'm not Harry and I'm not your friend!" He took a step towards the white faced boy.

"I'm Lee. And I'm pissed off; understand me?" Lee loomed over the skinny redhead at his feet.

"Lucius took me apart, and you helped," he spat bitterly downwards. "You took what was left of me and you fucked me over. At least Lucius was just in it for _revenge_ ; you did it for lust. If you ask me, _that's_ the more disgusting of the two motives." Lee's voice was low, deadly.

He could see Ron's shoulders shaking and he wouldn't be surprised if the other boy was crying.

 _Let him!_ He thought angrily.

"I won't forgive you. I might not ever forgive you," he said roughly, as his emotions threatened to take him down.

"I want to go home. I want to go home _now!_ " He shouted up through the cavernous hall.

The room didn't answer him, but from his feet, Ron did.

"You have to stay until you accept what I've said," his ex-best mate said plaintively.

"You stay out of this," Lee hissed. "You should just be glad that I didn't tell your _mum_ what you _did_."

The other boy fell silent at his words, which Lee was grateful for.

 _Dad_ , his brain supplied suddenly.

"Dad." He said quietly, his eyes opening wider.

"Dad! Dad! Dad! Please! Dad!" He began shouting with all of his might to the nearly empty room.

. . .

Severus threw himself out of bed as his son's shrill cry broke through the barriers of his sleep.

"Dad! Please! Dad!" His son cried frantically from his room.

Severus made his way quickly across the hallway and into his son's room—each step bringing him closer to wakefulness.

"Dad!" The cry was so much like how his son sounded normally, that Severus was left wondering if the child really _was_ asleep.

"Lee?" He questioned softly, but got no response. The lad was curled up in a ball, with his hands over his ears and his eyes screwed tightly shut against a sight he seemed unwilling to let himself see.

Soon, Severus was sitting on the bed and had the child in his arms. He hadn't even thought about the repercussions of picking him up.

"Shh, son; Dad's here, shh," Severus said as he rocked the boy and rubbed his back soothingly.

Though still asleep—Severus could tell from the haphazard motions the boy was exhibiting within his arms—Lee still managed to wrap his arms and legs around Severus's torso in a tight embrace.

"Lee, wake up," Severus said in a deeper voice, keeping the concern out of his tone as much as he could.

"Dad dad dad," his son still cried out, but was starting to come around.

And then a shift from within his arms, and Severus breathed a small sigh of relief as his child opened his eyes and looked at him full on.

"Dad!" There was recognition in those bright green eyes; followed by a release of tension throughout the boy's body.

"You came!" The child exclaimed, kissing him several times on his sleep roughened cheek.

Severus was a bit undone by that.

"Of course I did," he found himself stammering; feeling some disgust at his ability to be taken apart just by a few words and kisses.

"Thank you thank you thank you," the child gushed— _but not crying_ —his subconscious pointed out with interest.

"Was it a nightmare?" He asked curiously.

The child nodded his head in affirmation several times against his neck.

"May I ask?"

"I was in the lake," the child started out; his words putting a cold gush into Severus's gut.

"And?" Severus forced himself to ask.

"I was surrounded by merpeople and they kept shouting at me," Lee explained, pressing his cold nose into the space where Severus's neck and shoulder met. He told Severus about his return to the dark hallway and he told about the conversation that took place there between him and Ron.

"And then I wanted out, so I started calling for you; and you came and it's alright really now, and—," the child in his arms rambled on before being gently hushed by Severus.

"I am glad that your instinct was to call for me. There was a time not too long ago that you would not have thought to do that at all," Severus said softly; his hand cupped around the boy's face as he looked him in the eye.

"And you came!" The boy whispered to him with a smile that prompted Severus to lift the corner of his mouth up as well.

"Indeed. I did," Severus said, drawing the child more tightly into the protection of his arms.

"And I will continue to do so; as long as I am able," Severus promised to the small, almost asleep boy.

. . .

The next day, during one of Severus's free periods, he decided to go to the infirmary and visit young Mr. Weasley himself. Now that the boy was more lucid, perhaps he could finally get some much needed answers to the situation at hand.

By chance, he happened upon the room at a time that Molly was not there. It wasn't that he couldn't have handled the situation with her interference; it just merely would have been more difficult.

He walked into the room where the youngest Weasley male was being kept without even a second glance from Poppy. Given the level of recovery that Lee had exhibited since being in his care, it was hardly a wonder that she wasn't worried about his interference in this situation.

He had been keeping appraised of the boy's health and return to the land of the living, but the sight of the boy still managed to shock him a bit, even so.

It was only from his years spent in service to the Dark Lord that he managed to keep his face even.

"Ah Severus," Michael Turnskell greeted him warmly as he walked in.

He nodded curtly to the man before turning his attention back on the gaunt boy whose eyes had followed him unceasingly since his first step into the room.

"Good morning Mr. Weasley," he greeted the boy in a calm, and hopefully _neutral_ sounding, voice.

"Pro-pro-professor," the boy stammered; his voice sounding hoarse from disuse.

"I have kept my promise," Severus said gently, taking a seat next to the bed in the hopes that he would appear less intimidating.

Ron nodded mutely at him—eyes still wary.

"Although I still believe it would be helpful to your recovery if you would allow me to tell Poppy," he added seriously.

Here, he was rewarded by a longer stare from the boy, as well as a questioning look from Turnskill.

"Given that she already knows many of the other details of your ordeal, what do you have to lose to allow her to know this as well?" He asked, putting it fairly bluntly for the addled mind of the young Gryffindor.

 _Your son is a Gryffindor too, you know,_ his inner voice told him with a huff.

 _But he wasn't supposed to be_ , he argued back half-heartedly.

_Besides, his brain has not been warped by unknown chemicals._

Sweet Merlin—what a thought to have about one's own child—his mind shuddered at the implications of such a concept, and he felt a wave of pity go through him for the boy and his family.

"Well? What say you Mr. Weasley?" He prompted again when it looked as though the boy was never going to speak.

. . .

Ron Weasley stared at the man sitting beside his bed as though he had never seen him before.

_Is this really Snape?_

_Why would he want to help_ me _?_

"How's Harry doing?" He found himself asking instead of answering the man's unnerving question.

Briefly he saw a look of—annoyance?—pass across his professor's face, before it was replaced by that same look of general calmness that he had worn since coming into Ron's room that morning.

 _I almost wish that he'd hit me or yell or something,_ Ron thought to himself at the back of his mind.

Because with Snape acting this way, it was almost as though he _cared_ about Ron; something he knew was not possible. It'd be like Snape caring for _Harry_.

 _Impossible,_ he thought to himself with a grimace.

"I think you should be told that he no longer uses that name," Snape told him slowly; looking at him almost warily now.

It took a few minutes for Ron to process that out, but when he did, he was shocked.

He turned to the healer beside him; a presence he'd begun to believe in, if not exactly trust.

"Why did he say that?" He asked the other man quietly.

"Because it's true," the older man answered seriously, a touch of sorrow in his eyes.

"What's his name now?" Ron asked, not turning away from the healer, even though his question was meant for Snape.

"Lee," was Snape's short response.

"Lee Potter?" He all but whispered, as he finally turned back to look at the dark haired man.

The question elicited a sigh from his professor.

"I had not meant to get into this fully, but now I see that it is impossible to do otherwise," Snape said in a slow voice.

"Is he okay?" Ron found himself asking his fear aloud.

"He is recovering adequately," his professor said in a different voice.

_Was that pride I just heard?_

"His name is Lee Snape now. I adopted him—with his permission—over the Christmas holidays."

Silence, then—.

"WHAT?" He shouted, flinging himself at Snape, intent on wreaking havoc on the dark haired man beside him.

He didn't expect to be caught by wards on the bed, knocking him backwards onto the mattress with an "OOF!" as he hit. He didn't expect to be sedated by the healer, and he didn't expect to be given such a sorrowful look by his fearsome professor.

However, it was the last of these unexpected actions against him that stuck in his mind.

Lying on the bed, his limbs unresponsive and his eyes barely open, he fought back tears as he looked over to the man still sitting beside him.

"I am sorry that you are taking this as hard as you are, Mr. Weasley. However, I think you should know that your friend really is a great deal happier now. He has needed a parent for a long time, and though I did not know it originally, it appears that I was in need of a son," Snape said; his deep voice cutting through the fog of the drugs in Ron's system.

"Theeenn, tttteeeellll hhhhiimm." Ron slurred.

"Tell him?" Snape responded with some surprise. "About what happened?"

Ron nodded.

"And Madam Poppy?"

"Tellll afffter."

Ron felt his eyes rolling back in his head then, and drool already escaping his parted lips, as the sedative finally took over his control of his body.


	55. Evidence and Action

Severus looked at the scroll before him and then back up at the man who was his lover.

"You're sure?" He asked quietly.

"I wouldn't have brought it to your attention otherwise, Severus," Kingsley answered, wrapping a warm brown hand around his shoulders.

Severus put his head in his hands for a brief moment, before pulling himself out of it.

"Let's go find them," he said in a cold voice as he stood up.

"What about Minerva? She should be involved as well."

"Fine," Severus answered gruffly.

Kingsley rubbed a hand over his face tiredly as he looked back over the information on the scroll, where it clearly read:

**Magical Signature Matches - 99.99% positive:**

_**Marcus Flint  
Ashton Warrington** _

"Damn," Kingsley said softly, throwing the scroll back down on the desk lightly.

Silently he gathered the slightly smaller man next to him into an embrace; knowing all too well of the havoc that this was going to wreak on them over the next twelve hours.

He didn't say anything as Severus leaned into him, before finally letting go of his supposed dignity long enough to cling to him; shaking with a mixture of both anger and regret for what had happened, but also for what was _about_ to happen.

"Shh," he whispered finally as Severus began to grind his teeth in frustration over the situation that they now found themselves in.

"Severus," he said then, as the nervous tension continued unabated. He took the man's face in his hands and turned it towards his own. Severus's face was filled with pain as the various warring emotions took turns flitting across his features.

"It's _not_ fair," Kingsley said in an affirming tone of voice; saying the words that he knew Severus would never allow himself to speak.

"And you're right; Slytherins do get the short end of the deal more often than not," Kingsley added; speaking the words he had heard Severus growl out on more than one occasion.

"Always," Severus growled in a low voice.

"No," Kingsley said, causing Severus to shoot him a dark glare in response.

"What about Lee?" He asked so very, very softly.

He watched Severus flinch as though he had been slapped, and although Kingsley regretted his words, he knew that he would not take them back. His lover needed to be able to see this angle if he was ever to grow past the grudges he still carried with him.

"They're—they're just _children_ , Kingsley," Severus said weakly after a moment of painful silence. "All of them— _just_ _children_ ," he whispered, his eyes closed tightly within his pained face.

"Sometimes I wonder if any of us really grow up at all," Kingsley said, before pulling Severus back into his arms and kissing him soundly.

"I just love him so much," Severus whispered helplessly after they had finally parted once more. Kingsley didn't bother to ask whom he was talking about.

"I have to keep him safe; I have to protect him. I _promised_ him that," Severus continued; his forehead resting on Kingsley's shoulder.

"Then let's do that by putting these two away," Kingsley whispered more forcefully.

"They're not the only ones involved; they can't be. There are others still unaccounted for, correct?" Severus asked him in a dull voice.

"There are others," Kingsley agreed.

"And we've been through the whole of Slytherin?"

"Yes."

In front of him, Severus sighed before pulling himself upright and looking Kingsley straight in the eye. All traces of weariness and sorrow were now gone, leaving his lover's face now tinged only with hard determination.

"Let's get Minerva."

. . .

The students that they were retrieving from Slytherin were Marcus Flint and Ashton Warrington—a 7th and a 5th year, respectively. It had not escaped Severus's mind that the magical signatures on the charmed scroll found within Blaise's obliterated body might well have been forged. However, wizarding blood being what it was, he knew that such a premise would be almost impossible to prove, let alone _explain._

Deep in his heart though, he felt it more likely that the magical fingerprints were legitimate, just given the natures of the two older Slytherins.

As Severus had considered the intricate nature of the plot at hand, he had come to realize that whoever was behind this would have had to have been cunning, thrifty but above all else, _intelligent_.

Flint and Warrington, while excellent Quidditch players, were not exactly what one could define as being particularly known for their _intellect_ ; leaving him to suspect that these two were being thrown to the wind by whomever was the real mastermind.

 _All in order to throw us off the track_ , he thought bitterly.

 _But they're still involved; they've chosen their own paths_ , his mind said quietly. _They turned their backs on the house of Slytherin when they knowingly allowed members of their own house to be abducted for the purposes of rape and torture. We owe them_ nothing _._ I _owe them nothing._

With a full on snarl, Severus made his way into the Slytherin common rooms first, followed closely by Minerva, Kingsley and two of his handpicked aurors. Outside the door stood Hagrid and Poppy; Hagrid there mostly to get in the way, and Poppy present in case anything should go wrong.

Severus had argued adamantly against her being there, but she had shot every one of his concerns down easily, before finally shoving in a clincher.

" _This is_ _my house too_ , _Severus!_ " She had said, speaking in a harsh whisper; her eyes glinting dangerously at him.

He hadn't said anything more to her after that about it, but he had issued her a warning against foolhardiness before leaving her in the hallway with Hagrid.

"Only if you agree to the same, Severus," she had replied in an icy tone of voice, eliciting a small smirk from him in return. He could tell that she was frightened about how that day would turn out—and not only for him. There were innocent children involved here.

_Are any of us really innocent?_

The question refused to leave his brain, no matter how many times he tried to will it away.

However _,_ the matters at hand were what he had to focus on, and they were grave ones indeed. Primarily: finding Flint and Warrington, and getting the other Slytherins to safety; preferably to their rooms, which were warded against dangers of this kind.

The sight of their head of house in such a mood sent many of the meeker Slytherins to their rooms immediately, but some of the older ones hesitated, looking at him and the others questioningly.

"Sir?" Slytherin's Quidditch captain asked him.

Severus spared a glance at Montague, first making sure that Flint and Warrington were not in the vicinity, before answering him.

"As we've practiced Mr. Montague; we need to lockdown the Slytherin dorms for a period of time, only this time, it is not a drill," he said, speaking in a low voice.

He noticed Minerva shooting him a confused glance, but he ignored her in favor of the more dangerous situation at hand.

Montague, for all of his supposed stupidity, was actually quite intelligent when the situation called for immediate action in what was likely a dangerous set of circumstances.

"Take charge of the 4th year dorm, and pass the message on to the younger years. I'll take care of the 5th years and up," Severus said quickly, concisely.

"Yes sir," Montague said; his eyes wide with understanding. Quickly he turned and then made his way to the assigned rooms.

Severus knew that his message would have been well received by Montague and the other Slytherins present, if not Minerva and the other aurors. And Kingsley?

 _Well, Kingsley knows how Slytherins' minds work_ , he thought with a small smirk.

The message he had passed along to his Slytherins was quite simple: 'Stay away from the upper level rooms until this is over.'

He had told his house during their safety drills that he would only ever get personally involved if there was something serious going on. It was for that reason that all of the other drills had been conducted using only his prefects.

Severus waited for a minute or so to allow the younger years to fully engage their dorm wards, before making his next move towards the 7th years' dormitory. As he had told the others before going in there, if they were lucky, they might catch the two of them together. Of the two boys, Flint was easily the more dangerous, and it would be best to get him into custody first.

He had told them that so that in hopes that Flint and Warrington would think the same. He had made Warrington out to be a lackey in hopes of ensnaring him when he least expected it. While it was true that Flint was the more dangerous of the two, Warrington was easily the more cunning.

That's why Minerva was going in with him, and Kingsley was covering his back using a disillusionment spell. Using the spell in conjunction with Kingsley's dark skin and black robes, his lover blended nearly perfectly into the shadows of the Slytherin dormitory.

 _Virtually invisible,_ he thought with a discreet, but pleased nod towards the other man.

. . .

Minerva had looked at Severus questioningly when he had mentioned that they were not there for a "drill." Sometimes she found herself wondering if she really understood anything at all about the dark haired man who had adopted the ex-Harry Potter.

 _Drills?_ She thought in mystification to herself. And the way that Montague had picked up on the scheme so quickly- _almost as though Severus had been speaking in some kind of code_ , she thought with some mystification.

She shook her head slightly, and vowed to ask him about all of this at a later date—provided that they all came out of this together.

. . .

Severus—followed by Minerva and the two aurors, their backs covered by a hidden Kingsley—made his way cautiously into the 7th year dormitory. Two rows of four beds each met his eyes, their headboards against the outer stone walls of the room; leaving a pathway down the middle only large enough for two grown adults to walk side by side.

The room was strangely still and quiet, and Severus was immediately put on guard by it. He knew from his previous visits to this dormitory that Flint's bed was the farthest back, on the right. Thus, he took the right side of the path, and motioned silently for Minerva to fall in to his left, not quite beside him. One of the aurors guarded the entrance and the other followed the two professors at a distance.

The beds, with their ornate coverings and dark green curtains, were perfect hiding places for would be assassins. Severus spelled each open as he passed; noting with approval as Minerva did the same, while the lone auror watched their surroundings.

Severus could feel the hidden force of his lover's eyes on his back, but would have been hard pressed to pinpoint his location then, as his focus was usurped by the search for the guilty boys.

Halfway down the aisle, Severus's delicate hearing picked up on a sound, and he halted, barely aware of the others doing the same around him. Crouching down, he inched his way forwards, trying to get closer to the sound he had heard.

The room had two fireplaces, but both fires had been banked for the evening, hardly illuminating the far wall at all. The torches between the beds were lit, but the light barely made any dent on the darkness in the middle of the room where Severus and the others were now crouched.

Something rustled in the back corner on Severus's right side. Minerva glanced at him, indicating that she had heard it too that time. He had told them before going in that the only familiars his 7th years had were owls; so there were no animals in that room that could have caused the sounds.

Severus inched yet farther on, past the second set of beds just in time to see Flint jump out the far shadows and begin casting curses at them. Severus dove out of the way behind the third bed, barely cognizant of Minerva having done the same, only across the aisle from him. He could only assume that the auror had done the same, but he had no time to dwell on it as Flint continued to fire upon them.

The scowling boy was partially hidden behind his bed, two beds from Severus, and many of the curses he was firing at them were dark ones not taught by Hogwarts faculty. The black haired potions master barked out a binding spell, followed by a disarming spell shortly after, missing the mark only by a fraction each time. He could hear the others fighting back in similar ways now, and he knew it could only be a matter of time before Flint was brought down.

Unfortunately for them, they needed Flint alive, and were forced to only use spells with limited damage to a person's mind and body. Flint, and Warrington—wherever he was—were not limited to such rules.

Severus looked up and saw that one of Flint's spells had caught the curtains of one of the beds on fire; making it burn with an unearthly bluish-green light. It also served to illuminate the spot that Flint was hiding in just that much better.

He quickly ducked back behind his cover as Flint cast another curse, and heard a pain filled cry in response behind him.

 _One of the aurors, no doubt_ , he thought idly. The cry had briefly distracted Flint and he was able to spare a few moments of strategic thought to the furnishings around him.

Making a quick decision, he pushed himself under the bed he was crouched behind, and slid on his belly under the frame, pulling his legs and feet in sideways, so that his entire body was hidden from view. Then, he maneuvered himself to the farthest side from the wall, before parting the hanging cloth just enough to see the very edge of Flint's torso, standing not five feet away.

" _Petrificus_ _totalis_ ," he whispered, and then allowed himself a short breath of relief as the spell hit dead on, quickly dropping the board-like figure to the ground with an audible crack against the hard stone floor.

Silence once again reigned in the room, broken only by the harsh crackling of the magical fire on the bed across the aisle from him. Carefully Severus pulled himself from under the bed, coming out on the side closest to Flint only after casting a quick scan over that area.

Now free of the dark bed hangings, he surveyed the room and its occupants, mentally tallying the damage as he did. Minerva, although still crouched carefully behind a bed, was for all intents and purposes still as haughty and regal looking as ever. He looked farther on and was met with the sight of Kingsley bent down over the other auror, who was lying nearly halfway in the aisle of the room, two beds back.

Kingsley glanced up at him, catching his eye with a sharp look, before shaking his head swiftly and somberly.

 _Damn_ , Severus cursed to himself; yet _another_ dead at the hand of one of his Slytherins.

 _At least this one was grown_ , his inner voice added bitterly.

A second later and Kingsley was gone, the auror's body with him.

Carefully, Severus made his way to where Flint was now laying, his body frozen, while his eyes continued to glare upwards; fixing the Slytherin head of house with a look of pure venom.

Severus, for his part, sneered cruelly back down at the traitor of the Slytherin house; not allowing himself to give voice to the anger he could feel rushing through his heart and gut at seeing him in such a position.

They searched the rest of the room, but to no avail. Warrington was not there, and apparently had not told his co-conspirator his whereabouts either; as Severus came to find out through a touch of illegal legilimity.

They had just started to move Flint out to the common room as Warrington finally made his appearance. As Severus had suspected, the boy had been hiding in the 5th year boy's dorm room, which was located at the end of the hall, more than thirty feet from where Severus now stood.

For a moment, there was completely silence, and then they both reacted, pulling their wands and casting different spells towards each other nearly simultaneously.

" _Incendio noxum_ ," Warrington shouted calmly at his head of house.

" _Stupefy_ ," Severus growled towards the Slytherin, only a split second after.

Out of the corner of his eye, Severus saw a black blur coming at him, hitting nearly the same moment as Warrington's spell did. Pain shot through Severus's left arm as the curse hit, and then spiked as they hit the floor; forcing a low grunt of pain from the otherwise stoic man. Thankfully—for his dignity—Kingsley fell atop of him, muffling the sound as he did.

Warrington had dodged Severus's curse, and now, instead of cursing them back, surprisingly had put his wand up to his own temple.

Severus, fighting to remain conscious amidst the burning pain in his arm and to a lesser extent, the rest his body, looked up in horror as Warrington obliviated himself right in front of them.

"No!" He indistinctly heard Minerva shout as Warrington slumped to the ground, a disturbingly blank look on his young face.

Severus fought against the desire to moan; his arm literally feeling on fire. His whole body felt heavier, even as Kingsley lifted himself off of his chest. He began sweating fiercely, even though the Slytherin rooms had never been anywhere close to hot. He could feel his heart racing, and he could hear his breaths wheezing in his lungs as Kingsley peered down to look at him.

His lover's face was tight with concern, but Severus's vision had begun turning black, and he could barely see the other man through the darkness.

Abruptly, a memory of his son pushed its way through his addled mind, giving him something to grasp onto, if only mentally.

It was from the day that he had gotten hurt after the boy had mastered the mind hold spell and kicked him soundly in the knee. He had finally gotten through assuring the boy that he had no reason to be sorry for hurting him, when the child had poked him in the ribs.

" _Ow," he'd said; only to be rebutted with a stern eyed glare from the small boy._

" _That didn't hurt," the child had argued seriously._

" _How do you know?" He had asked, trying to sound incredulous for his boy's sake._

" _Because my dad's tougher than that," Lee had said with finality, before dropping his head back down on Severus's shoulder once more._

Severus was barely aware that Poppy was now beside him as well, force-feeding him potions. He was occluding in an effort to keep the pain at bay, but that was an automatic reaction; one borne from his years of service as a Death Eater. Currently, it was the only thing that was keeping him from screaming aloud; dignity be damned to hell.

"Severus? Can you hear me?" Poppy was asking him now, but reality was quickly slipping away from him, like water through a sieve.

Finally, Severus's last thought—before slipping completely into unconsciousness—was to wonder whether or not his son was still safe.


	56. A Long Night

Lee was pacing their quarters, waiting for his dad— _or anyone at all_ —to get back and clue him into how everything had gone. His dad had told him the basics of what was going to happen that evening, but no details; and now, as late afternoon became evening, and then _late_ evening, Lee had begun to worry that something had gone wrong.

His dad had warded the entrance to their quarters only to allow a few select people in or out, and currently, under the watchful presence of Jimmy, Lee was _not_ one of them.

Lee clenched his fists in frustration and threw himself down on their couch with a loud THUMP.

"Please!" He argued desperately with Jimmy.

"Sorry little dude! Your dad gave me strict orders. If I break them, he'll lose his confidence in me!" Jimmy answered back helplessly.

Lee knew Jimmy was right, but he still couldn't shake the feeling that something had gone horribly wrong, and somehow his dad now needed him.

"Please," he whispered, fighting valiantly against letting himself cry.

It was at that point that the door opened, and Lee quickly grabbed his wand and ducked down at the end of couch, hiding himself from view. Even though Severus had assured him time and time again that no one could hurt Lee from within their home, the fear was still there.

Lee's eyes widened in surprise as Professor McGonagall made her way into their quarters.

"Lee? Are you still up?" She called out as she walked in, shutting the door behind her with a low clunk.

"Is my Dad okay?" He asked, popping up from his hiding place.

McGonagall flinched at his sudden appearance, putting a hand to her chest in surprise.

"Goodness gracious Lee! What were you doing down behind there?"

Lee looked at her with a critical eye, annoyed that she hadn't answered his question. She looked tired, and her robes were wrinkled. Her hair, though still in a bun, looked somewhat wild—as though she had put it up in a hurry.

"Where's my dad?" He asked in a serious voice, looking her directly in the eyes.

"He's—," she said, hesitating for one small moment, "he's in the infirmary, being tended to by Poppy."

 _I knew it!_ He thought with an icy rush of fear through his stomach. _Please let him be okay!_

"I want to see him."

"He is resting now; you can see him in the morning," McGonagall answered him matter-of-factly.

He stared at her, surprise etched vividly across his features.

"I need to see him _now_ ," he said, repeating himself with a little more force.

"What you _need_ to do, young man," McGonagall answered testily, "is to go to bed! It is long after midnight. In fact, you _should_ have already been in bed to begin with!"

Why oh why did this forbidding version of his head of house have to come back _now_?

"You don't understand," Lee answered, fists clenched tightly at his sides.

"He _needs_ me," he said, gritting his teeth against saying what he really wanted to say to her then.

"No, Mr. Snape. It is _you_ who does not understand _me_. You are going to bed _now_ , and then we shall _see_ about _letting_ you see him _in the morning!_ Just wait until he learns about your atrocious behavior here tonight," she trailed off, clearly just then remembering what Snape's current status was.

Lee swallowed against his anger and tried once more.

"You're not us! You're not part of us! He would want me there. I know it!" He pleaded with her, his eyes wide in his head.

"You are just a boy, Mr. P-Snape," she responded in an even icier tone of voice.

_She nearly called me Mr. Potter! How dare she!_

He growled at her and tried to rush past her, knowing in his heart that his was a stupid plan, but desperation making him try for it anyways.

Five minutes later found him staring at his bedroom door from where he sat upon his bed.

He had run towards the door, and she had simply transfigured him into a small fern for his troubles. While in that state, she had simply picked him up and put him into his room, before smirking and warding the door against his leaving.

Now—having returned to being a boy once more—he was pacing his room, fuming at the woman's audacity in thinking that she could keep him from his father!

"I want my dad, I want my dad!" He muttered to himself, curling his arms around his head and crouching on the floor as he repeated the mantra. He was so tense with the need to see his father with his own eyes that he didn't even notice that his fingernails were clawing lines into the flesh of his arms.

And then, an epiphany hit him and he dropped his arms to his sides as he quickly stood up. Blood was pounding in his ears as he made his quiet request to the empty room.

"Jayda."

She looked distraught as he outlined what was going on, but when he told her that McGonagall was keeping him from his father, she got downright indignant.

"Snapes' need being together!" Jayda squeaked emphatically, nodding her head up and down energetically; her bulbous eyes tearing up at the idea of keeping her master and his son unnecessarily apart.

And with that, she snapped her fingers and they disappeared from the room with a small pop.

McGonagall didn't even realize that Lee had left.

. . .

"Dad?" Lee asked in a tremulous voice.

Severus Snape lay unconscious on the bed in front of him, propped on his right side, face forwards.

They were in a small private room at the back of the infirmary; a place that Lee had never ventured before. At any other time, he would have taken the opportunity to look around more closely, but at that moment, he only had eyes for the ill looking man before him. Jayda had just popped him in here, and then left without another word. Truth be told, he hadn't even noticed her departure.

"Dad?" He asked, his voice rising as his fear increased. He took a step forwards to where his dad was lying so still and quiet. The man's left arm was bandaged tightly, but otherwise, he looked the same as ever. He was even still wearing his standard black robes; Poppy having finally decided that he was likely to be more comfortable in them than he would have been in infirmary issued pajamas.

Lee took another step towards his dad and reached out a hand to lightly touch his dad's shoulder.

"Come on dad," he said in a quivering voice. "It's time to get up now," he sniffed, wiping a hand under his glasses hurriedly.

"You can't sleep yet," he continued on, ignoring the way his fingers were shaking. "You still gotta k-kiss me g-g-goodnight," he stammered, blinking rapidly.

"And you haven't asked me," he took a deep breath, "you haven't asked me if I've brushed m-my teeth yet." He shook his dad's shoulder a little, feeling his heart beating rapidly in his ears.

But the dark clothed man would not respond to him.

"Dad," he stated simply. "Come on dad; wake up. It's just me, it's j-just Lee," he sniffled, taking his glasses off and wiping his eyes angrily.

Glasses still in hand, he tried again.

"Daddy," he said, speaking in a more desperate tone of voice. "You haven't asked me how my d-d-day went. You _always_ do that, daddy," he said, unable to stop his lip from trembling now.

"Who's going to keep me from getting lost?" He whispered hurriedly around hitching breaths. "You're the only one—," he sniffled again, "you're the only one who's ever held my hand—and—and kept m-m-me s-s-s-safe," his breath hitched and his entire body trembled for a moment.

"And you never wanted to l-lose m-m-me," he said around the tears that were falling freely now, wetting his shirt collar. Blindly, he put his glasses down on the table next to his dad's bed.

"Who's gonna hold me at night?" He asked in desperation, quickly toeing off his shoes; an idea suddenly forming in his mind.

"Who's gonna tell me—gonna tell me that they l-l-love m-me?" He asked, swallowing thickly before pulling himself up onto the bed and looking his daddy directly in the face.

"Oh daddy, please wake up." He whimpered, sniffling forcefully as he lay down next to the feverish form of his beloved protector.

"You still have to teach me to sh-shave, someday. And that's, that's not for a little while still, daddy," he said, his voice becoming more muffled as he hid his face against his daddy's warm chest.

"Please don't—please don't," He gasped, unable to actually voice his request for the man not to die.

 _Not now_ , he thought wildly. _Not now that I know what it's like—what it's like to have a daddy_.

"Please," he said instead. "Please daddy. I-I n-need you. I didn't even know it—isn't that strange, daddy? I didn't know that I needed you," he said, still crying as he buried his head in his daddy's robes, his fingers tightly wound in the dark fabric.

"Who's going to make me feel b-b-better after my nightmares?" He asked, squeezing himself up tightly next to his daddy, trying to pretend that the man was holding him back just like he always did.

"No one else can touch me when I sleep. Everyone else gets hurts," he babbled hurriedly.

"Everyone around me _always_ — _always_ gets hurt. And now you—and now you; oh daddy, I'm _sorry_. I'm so _sorry_! Please get better! Please wake up, please daddy, please, please," he said, barely able to speak around his anguished tears.

His body was shuddering, wracking with his sobs, even as he began unbuttoning the front of his daddy's robes. His fingers were badly shaking, but he finally got enough of them open so that he could squeeze his way inside them.

Then, as fast as he could, he buttoned them back up behind himself. Now, with his eyes closed—the tears still leaking out just as hard as before—he could imagine that the tightness of the cloth behind his back really was his dad's arms.

"Oh daddy, please," he begged quietly, his nose up against his daddy's neck. He was wetting the man's shoulders with his tears, but he didn't care. He was probably stretching out the man's robes, but he didn't care. He had both hands tightly fisted in his daddy's shirtfront and he wasn't going to let go.

 _Never, never, never again_ , he chanted wildly in his mind, while his body curled up in his SLOB position.

"I'm your SLOB daddy—your small lump of boy—that's what you c-c-called me daddy. Remember Daddy? Remember? I'm your SLOB! I'm not your freak or your idiot or your w-w-worthless piece of sh-sh-shit," his mouth quivered wildly.

"I'm _your_ SLOB! Please, daddy. Please, pl-pl-please! I'm _yours_ ," he tried once more, his breaths hitching spasmodically around nearly every word. He rubbed his wet face against his daddy's shirt, as the force of his tears briefly increased.

"You love me, daddy. You do. You said so. You did," he said, beginning to babble again.

"And I love you daddy—m-more than _anyone_ else in the whole world. Please," he said, his muscles trembling, as his tears finally began letting up.

His body and head ached, but the pain in his heart was easily the worst of all. He pushed his face and head against his daddy's torso once more, burying himself as far as possible into his daddy's embrace.

"Please daddy." He whispered in exhaustion.

"I can't do this again," he added, barely conscious of what he had said; sleep quickly overtaking his senses.

He never even heard the click of the door as it shut quietly behind him.

. . .

"I think you two have seen quite enough," Kingsley Shackelbolt said, peering down sternly at the two frightened looking boys before him.

"I'm sorry sir," Neville answered shamefully, staring resolutely at the floor.

"Look at me," Kingsley said in a commanding tone.

Neville looked up at him, showing Kingsley how red and puffy his eyes were. Behind him, Draco stood nearly motionlessly—his hands and arms tightly wound around the Gryffindor's arm. Like Neville, Draco's eyes and face showed recent evidence of having just cried, but unlike the other boy, Draco's tears still showed wetly on his face.

"Where are you supposed to be? Show me," Kingsley instructed softly, not allowing his emotions to show on his face.

The boys led him down the hallway—well, Neville did the leading, really—to another nondescript door and walked in without knocking. Kingsley followed them quietly like a large hulking bodyguard. He shut the door behind him and quickly glanced around the room.

There were two beds in the room, each pushed up against a different wall. There was a trunk under each boy's bed, one scratched and dented—although still structurally sound—while the other was pristine and sleek. It was not hard for the auror to guess which bed was which. However, he noted with interest that only _one_ of the beds actually looked as though it had really been slept in.

He had been told about these two boys, and how they had come to be staying together in the infirmary. It was a mind boggling tale if he had understood Poppy correctly, and now as he looked at the two boys standing nervously before him, he felt that things were only going to get stranger.

"Why were you eavesdropping? Shouldn't you two have been asleep some time ago?" He asked, knowing that he looked imposing and not really caring. He was too tired for that.

"Dr-Draco had to go to the bathroom," Neville answered, his voice just barely a whisper.

"And you had to accompany him?" Kingsley knew why, but he was curious to see what the young Gryffindor would say.

"He can't go alone, sir," Neville said, looking absolutely miserable.

"So you were going to the bathroom," Kingsley stated in a questioning tone.

"Er, coming back actually," Neville clarified softly.

 _Good—one less thing_ , Kingsley thought idly.

"And so you decided to stick your noses where they didn't belong because—?" He looked at them intently and noted with interest that they were _both_ staring at the floor now, but only Neville was truly looking contrite for his actions. Draco, on the other hand, merely looked cowed and terrified.

_What on earth have they been through this year?_

"It's my fault sir, I'm sorry sir," Neville blurted out, his face turning red as he admitted his fault.

"Why?" Kingsley asked in a soft voice.

"I heard Lee's voice, and I, well I-I," Neville stammered.

"Why don't we sit down?" Kingsley softly suggested, feeling sudden pity for the boys standing before him.

"Yes sir," Neville whispered in relief, quickly scrambling out of his way. He headed to his bed, Draco following quickly behind him.

"If I may?" Kingsley asked, waving a hand towards the other bed.

"S-Sure," Neville said quietly, after glancing quickly over at the pale haired boy sitting beside him.

"Is this Draco's bed?" Kingsley asked.

"Uh, yeah—er, yes sir." Neville answered.

"Is this where he sleeps?"

"It's where he goes to bed," was Neville's odd response.

Kingsley sat down gingerly on the bed, looking it over with a practiced eye.

"It seems comfortable enough."

"It's the same as mine, sir," Neville whispered. Draco was once again latched to his arm, Kingsley saw with interest.

"Except it doesn't have you," Kingsley added for him.

Neville shook his head in the negative.

"Is Draco your friend?" Kingsley asked, curious as to how the boy would respond.

Neville looked up at him at that question. The confusion was easy to read on his face.

"I guess, sort of," he answered slowly.

"Was he your friend before?" Kingsley asked.

"No, not really," Neville admitted.

"But now?"

The round faced boy in front of him hesitated, biting his lip and looking at his fingers—as though they held clues on how he should answer.

"Now he's all alone. He feels safe with me, I think," Neville said finally, looking back at Draco once more.

"Draco?" Kingsley's tone indicated that he was now speaking to the thin blond haired boy.

Kingsley watched with concern as the thin blond haired boy flinched, but continued to stare at the floor.

"He probably won't talk to you. He hasn't said anything to anyone yet, except me," Neville supplied.

"Have you tried asking him about who took him? Or where he was when he was taken?" Kingsley asked softly, his attention back on Neville.

Neville had barely opened his mouth to speak when a sound came from the small boy beside him.

"Cold," Draco whispered to them, his eyes fixed permanently on the floor.

Neville's eyes had opened widely with Draco's admission, but now they resumed a more thoughtful look.

"What else do you remember, Draco?" Neville asked, speaking very gently and calmly to the other boy.

Kingsley watched with some amazement as the young Malfoy slowly raised his eyes to look at Neville.

"Cold. Hurt," the boy said, commencing his short answer with a soft sob.

. . .

Neville looked at the smaller boy next to him and felt his heart clench down hard at hearing the pitiful sound that had escaped his former bully's lips.

Silently he put an arm around the boy and drew him in closer to the warmth of his body. He knew that Shackelbolt was watching them closely, but he didn't care.

Neville had overheard Madam Pomfrey speaking to Professor Snape about what had happened to the smaller boy, and nearly had been physically sick with what she had revealed to the older Slytherin.

Like Ron, and possibly Lee—as he had begun to suspect—Draco Malfoy had been raped and beaten. And if that wasn't bad enough, he had been raped and beaten by at least two different men, if not a few more. He had been starved, and he had been tortured; all for the sick sadistic pleasure of two monsters.

It was hard to remember his old grudges against the blond boy with those thoughts in mind. And, given that Draco didn't seem to be able to remember either, it seemed silly to continue on with the dynamics of their previous animosity filled relationship. It was almost as though they had both been given a second chance.

Neville, who often had caught himself wishing for exactly such a thing regarding his parents, was therefore not one to ignore such an opportunity.

"Hurt," the boy beside him whimpered again, clutching back at Neville hesitantly. "Pain. Screamed and screamed—wouldn't stop, wouldn't stop," Draco said, shaking silently beside him.

"Who Draco?" Shackelbolt interjected, making them both jump with his sudden reinsertion into their conversation.

Draco only turned frightened eyes onto Neville's face and shook his head back and forth wildly, his lower lip quivering.

"Can't—I-I-I can't," Draco said, surprising them again, only this time with his use of the word, "I." It was a word that he had not used since Neville had found him sitting naked on his bed, shivering and injured.

"Draco," Shackelbolt spoke again. "We just want to help keep you safe," the large man said gently, his eyes looking pained after finally hearing Draco speak.

"Done is done," Draco answered shakily. "Was hurt—can't fix," he said dully, still speaking in fuller sentences; to the continued amazement of the others in the room.

"They should be punished for what they did," Shackelbolt said in a hard voice.

Draco only shrugged weakly from under Neville's arm; his head now turned into Neville's shoulder.

"He just wants to keep you from being hurt again, Draco," Neville whispered softly into his ear.

The boy just shrugged again, even as he opened his mouth to answer.

"He'll fail," Draco said matter-of-factly, his gray eyes staring at nothing as Neville continued to try and comfort him.

After a while, Shackelbolt got up and came to stand on the side closest to the Gryffindor.

"Do your families not care about you now?" He asked softly, looking at Neville carefully, causing a slight blush to come across the round faced boy's face.

"His doesn't. And mine," he paused, looking away for a moment. "Well, nothing's really happened to _me_ , so there's not really any reason for her to worry."

Shackelbolt's lip twisted at his response, as though he were about to argue with what Neville had said. Neville insides twisted nervously as he waited for the man to speak.

"I wouldn't say that _nothing_ has happened, Mr. Longbottom," the man said softly after another few moments, looking at him in a challenging way, as though he expected Neville to contest his statement.

But Neville had nothing to say to that, so he kept his mouth shut.

Shackelbolt looked away from them for a moment and then back again, his face suddenly very tired looking.

"If he says anything else about what happened, please inform either me or Madam Pomfrey," he told them in a slightly more formal voice, indicating an end to their conversation.

"Yes sir," Neville answered softly.

"But for now, I suggest you get some sleep. Don't let me find you eavesdropping again. If you need someone to talk to, tell Pomfrey to contact me. If I can, I'll come. And then we'll talk, understand?" The man looked at him sharply, leaving Neville floundering for something to say.

"Y-Yes sir," he answered finally, looking at the auror in some surprise.

The man—who was little more than a stranger to the two twelve-year old boys sitting on that bed—had just offered them something more valuable than all of the adults in Neville's life had ever thought of providing: Someone who was willing to listen to him just _talk_.

"You're certain, sir?" Neville checked, still not believing that Shackelbolt had really suggested such a ludicrous idea.

"More so than I've been in a long while," the man said seriously, looking at them both closely for another moment, before nodding to himself and exiting the room.

As soon as the door closed all the way, the lights abruptly dimmed down to a near blackness, save for an orb of light that was sitting in the same place the auror had been only previously.

Neville blinked at the small nightlight that had just appeared, and then a smile crept over his face as he realized where it had come from.

"Come on Draco," he said, pulling the boy under the covers with him.

It was the first night that he hadn't made Draco try to sleep in his own bed. The blond boy seemed to realize that as well, and expressed his thanks by nuzzling his nose against Neville's cheek gently.

Neville gasped at the sensation, but quickly controlled himself as Draco curled up comfortably around him. With the hand not occupied with the boy beside him, Neville reached out for the covers and pulled them up clumsily around them.

It didn't take long before both boys were fast asleep.

. . .

Standing in front of the bed which now held both the potions master and his son, Kingsley let out a deep sigh of regret for the two boys whose room he had just left.

"Poor kids," he whispered, his eyes falling on the top of Lee's head from where the small boy was buried in next to Severus.

He had been terrified earlier that day when the curse had been cast towards his lover. And afterwards, he had been surprised to discover just how hard the idea of nearly losing Severus had really hit him.

If— _when_ Severus awoke, they were going to have to have a serious discussion about where their relationship was going, and whether or not Severus really wanted such a thing to develop between them.

For Kingsley had realized that his feelings for the snarky professor had now passed beyond the realm of simple fondness or desire, and were beginning to resemble what one might be able to describe as _love_ , disturbingly enough.

Therefore, Severus simply _had_ to wake up—just so Kingsley could see the expression on the man's face when he told him about his revelation.

Snickering quietly to himself, Kingsley pulled off his boots and padded quietly over to the opposite side of the bed. One small transfiguration spell later, and suddenly the bed was big enough for all three of them.

He lay down behind his lover and pulled the slightly smaller man into his chest gently, mindful of the small boy still mostly hidden in the front of Severus's robes.

" _Nox_ ," Kingsley whispered, before pressing his face firmly against his lover's back and closing his eyes tightly against the tide of rising fear in his heart.


	57. Dark Night

Jimmy had watched over the room that housed his potions master very carefully that evening. It had hurt him deeply to hear Lee pleading with the unconscious form of his father, before crying himself to sleep within the confines of the man's robes. And now that Kingsley had fallen asleep in the same bed, Jimmy had finally come to a decision of his own.

There in the darkness of pre-dawn, he made literally made his move. With no small amount of difficulty, Jimmy pulled a smaller form of himself out of the very stones that comprised the wall of the private room. The wall groaned faintly around his emerging form, but Jimmy hushed it with a look, and it fell silent quickly thereafter.

Finally he was standing within the room, beside the bed with its three notable occupants. His appearance was slightly different than it had been before; his "skin" smoother and nearly cobalt in its look that dark night.

" _Lillian_ ," Jimmy thought after a moment, effortlessly calling the boy's snake to the room.

He heard the sound of her hissing before he actually saw her slithering over the mattress where the trio lay.

" _What do you taste?_ " He asked her, indicating to Severus with a nod of his head.

/Darknesssss/ she hissed softly.

" _Around Severus?_ "

/Yesss. Darknesssss and pain/, she said, slithering up and down the dark haired man's prone figure.

" _How is he doing?_ " Jimmy asked somberly.

/Badly. It is consssuming him. He will be dead sssoon, if sssomething isss not done to ssstop it./

Jimmy reached out an arm and lightly touched his potion master's left shoulder.

/Tassste, don't look/, Lillian advised him seriously.

Jimmy took her advice, concentrating on changing his senses around to do what she had said.

A broiling film of murky darkness covered the man, sliding haphazardly around his body as Jimmy looked on in horror. It almost seemed as though he could hear it muttering angrily to itself as it smothered the man's life force bit by bit.

Not knowing what else to do, he swiped a hand out at its fog-like consistency, trying to physically remove it from Severus's body.

He watched in some surprise as some of the gaseous monstrosity actually came away with just the movement of his arm. He looked down at his hand and saw some of the inky foulness clinging to his fingers. In disgust, he shook his hand, adding magic behind the movement, and managed to remove it from his person and into the corner of the room instead. Once there, it tried to slink away into the very stones themselves, but he leveled a glare at the walls and they held firm against it.

Having been denied an exit, the misty black gunk began swirling feebly in the corner where he had tossed it.

Jimmy turned back to his potions master and repeated the movement, pulling his hand down the man's body with a bit more force this time, and getting more of the darkness off as he did so. He flung it angrily into the corner and then began working in earnest on clearing the black filth from his professor.

As dawn began approaching, he looked at Severus with a critical eye, and was forced to admit defeat— _but only for the night,_ he promised himself fiercely. He cleared the rest of the inky mess from his fingers and then quickly strode over to where his little dude lay within the confines of Severus's robes.

He gently touched the child's face and leaned over to whisper into his ear.

" _Sleep, Lee. Wake up when your dad does. No more nightmares for you on this dark night_ ," he said; before straightening back up and going over to the thick ball of painful energy that he had cast into the corner of the room.

" _Come here_ ," he commanded it, with a crook of his finger.

It whined in defiance to him, and he felt himself becoming angry with it.

" _I surround you,_ " he stated in a commanding voice. " _You are in_ my _domain now_. _You will do as I say,_ " he said, working his magic around the evil that whimpered and whined before him.

And then suddenly, the ball of gluey darkness found its self compacted within Jimmy's fist. He exerted his strength over it, pressing it still tighter down; turning it into a near solid ball of black, before holding it up for the room to see.

" _Witness this now: I constrict you, I bind you, and now you are no more than an extension of my own self."_

The sounds coming from the tiny sphere were pitifully weak.

" _The magic of these stones constrict you, own you, and subjugate you. Acquiesce or be destroyed,"_ he said with a glare towards the small circular form sitting in the middle of his palm.

The ball of darkness whimpered one last time, and then with something akin to a sigh, it sank down into Jimmy's stone palm, disappearing from sight. Jimmy could feel it swirling through him, but he easily overpowered it, binding it to himself, and in turn, using it to boost his own—not insubstantial—energy levels.

" _Alert me if anything happens,_ " he informed the purple and yellow snake that was now nestled in next to her young master.

With barely another look at the room, he allowed the walls to claim him once more; sinking into them easily like a man into a heated bath after a hard day's work.

As the sunlight began peeking into the room, he watched the door open quietly, revealing a tired looking Poppy.

He watched with amusement as she looked at the trio asleep on the bed and rolled her eyes—clearly not surprised to find them all altogether.

"Oh Minerva?" She called out over her shoulder.

. . .

Jimmy returned the following night—and then the next, after the dark fog refused to completely leave Severus's body after the second go around.

Finally, at the end of the third night, he looked down at his potions master in tentative relief. The toxic fog was finally gone from the man's energy and magical signatures; and instead was now trapped within the walls of the castle itself, slowly being neutralized into something more benign.

After having Lillian double check for him—her sense of taste was much finer tuned than his own—he allowed himself to feel hope once more for the trio laid out before him. They had already been through so much, especially Lee and his father, and he had a very bad feeling that their lives were only going to get worse from here on out.

" _But at least he will live,"_ he murmured out loud to Lillian.

/And the child will sssurvive in turn,/ she added, knowingly.

" _Yes_ ," he agreed softly, before disappearing into the comforting seclusion of the walls; taking the remainder of the dark murkiness with him as he went.

. . .

Early that same morning, just as the far eastern sky was just beginning to tinge purple with the promise of a new day, Severus opened his eyes. He was stiff, and he was sore, but he was very much alive.

He looked down in surprise at the black haired head sticking out of the front of his robes. Clearly he was in some part of the infirmary, but why in Merlin's name was his child packed in so tightly against him?

He tried to turn over, but his movement was hindered by the large warm presence of his lover, who was apparently nestled up tightly behind him.

"About time you woke up," the man's voice rumbled into his chest; his voice thick with exhaustion.

"Why do I suddenly feel as though I am encased in a pile of pups?" He asked sarcastically, not wanting to admit to himself how very serious this must have all been for those around him.

"Well, you are _my_ bitch," Kingsley whispered seductively into his ear.

Severus's eyes widened at the other man's tone, before glancing quickly down at his small lump of boy cocooned within his robes. The child had not moved, but that didn't mean he wasn't awake. Severus knew the child's sleeping habits far better than _that_.

"Kay . . ." he began, a warning clear in his voice.

"I know, I know," the man purred against the side of his neck.

Severus fought to pull himself up into a sitting position. He moved slowly against the combined weight around him; his body much weakened from the fight it had fought against the curse Warrington had wielded against him.

Beside him, Kingsley stood, and then helped stabilize him by surrounding him with pillows.

"Now you are the one who is cocooned," Kingsley said, kissing him lightly on his sleep disheveled head.

"Speaking of which," Severus gestured towards the quiet lump now lying atop his chest.

"Who has been watching him in my absence?" He asked in some concern.

"No one has—," Kingsley started, before being interrupted by a shocked Severus.

"What in Merlin's name do you mean by that? He is just a child!" Severus hissed furiously.

 _Specifically, he's_ my _child, damn it._

"Calm down Sev, and let me explain," Kingsley said, his dark brown eyes shining brightly in the darkness of early dawn.

"He has been next to you—asleep—for the past _three days_ ," his lover said while looking at Severus very intently.

"Pardon?" Severus answered in surprise, his anger evaporating as quickly as it had come.

"Somehow he managed to make his way in here without _anyone's_ knowledge. Later that night, when I finally found the two of you together, he had already cried himself to sleep," Kinglsey said in a soft voice while Severus's mind reeled with the implications of what those events meant in his son's development.

"And then you couldn't wake him?" Severus asked worried; silently wondering if the effects of the curse hadn't bled over into the small form of his son.

"Poppy checked him for the curse," Kingsley answered quickly, correctly interpreting the look on Severus's unusually pale face.

"He's _fine_ ," he emphasized, sitting down on the bed facing Severus.

"Minus being asleep for three days?" Severus sneered at the incongruities within the story he was being told.

"She thinks that Jimmy must have intervened in some way, for when she tried to remove him from your side, she couldn't do it."

Severus's eyes narrowed thoughtfully, thinking back to the time he had spent with the child just prior to Christmas. They had been bound closely together then, but not _that_ closely.

"I do hope that Poppy continued to feed and water him during this time," Severus said derisively, hiding his fear for his son behind the overt unpleasantness of his response.

The look that Kingsley gave him clearly showed that the man saw through his behavior, but was willing to let it go for the time being.

"Indeed, she did." Kingsley said, entwining his fingers with Severus's clammy ones.

"Why not wake him now and see how he is for yourself?"

Severus glared at the man opposite him, annoyed at his lover's clear logic.

"Would you mind leaving us for a bit then?"

"Wouldn't have it any other way," Kingsley said matter-of-factly, before leaning forwards and catching Severus by surprise as he quickly planted a kiss on his beard roughened face.

"Ouch," Kingsley said playfully, winking at Severus as he pulled out his wand and cleaned him up a bit; even going so far as to clean his teeth and apply a breath freshening charm.

This time, when he leaned over to kiss the cleanly shaven potions professor, he moved much more slowly; clearly taking the time to enjoy the kiss before standing up and leaving the room.

Severus stared out after him, even as he closed the door; purposefully memorizing the blissful smile that the other man had worn after breaking their kiss.

"I think he likes you," a small voice said from his chest, surprising him out of his reverie.

He looked down and was relieved to see the bright emeralds of his child's eyes staring solemnly back up at him from where he was still ensconced within the front of his robes.

"How long have you been awake?"

"Not very long," his child said quietly, turning his head to rub his cheek against the front of Severus's cloth shirt.

Severus carded a hand through the boy's soft hair, stroking his head gently. It had always served to put a smile on Lee's face, but this time he watched painfully as a tear slipped down the child's face, even as he sought to move himself closer to the man's touch.

"Child?" He asked quietly; his hand still moving tenderly through the boy's hair as the soft morning light continued to fill the room.

He was ready for the tear that crept down his son's face this time, but that didn't mean it hit him any less painfully. He watched as the child wiped his face dry on his shirt, clearly fighting with himself not to let go of any more.

"Lee." He stated in a slightly more commanding voice, trying to make his son look up into his face.

He felt and watched as the boy drew in a deep shuddery breath against him.

"I'm not angry with you Lee," he said with some confusion at his son's current behavior.

"Well, that's good. I didn't think you were," his son stated in an easy voice that completely contradicted the anguished expression on his face.

"Please tell me what's bothering you, son. I cannot help if I do not know the source of the problem," Severus asked imploringly, his hand reaching out and carefully cupping one of the child's still damp cheeks.

"I wish," his boy paused, breathing in another shuddering breath. "I wish that I hadn't let myself care so much," his son finished just under his breath. It was only Severus's delicate hearing that allowed him to discern the child's words at all.

"What do you mean?" Severus found himself asking, speaking nearly as quietly as his son had.

The child looked up at him then; vibrant green eyes piercing him to his very soul, shining wetly in the warm golden light streaming in from the window.

"You almost died," his son whispered in a grave wide-eyed tone.

Severus looked into his child's eyes and found himself being pulled inwards by the desperate emotions he saw bubbling over there.

" _Oh daddy, please wake up." His son had whimpered, sniffling forcefully as he lay down next to the feverish form of his beloved protector._

Severus's breath caught in his throat as he witnessed his son's memories from when the boy was trying to wake him.

" _Everyone around me always—always gets hurt. And now you—and now you; oh daddy, I'm sorry. I'm so sorry! Please get better! Please wake up, please daddy, please, please," his son had said, barely able to speak around his anguished tears._

_His body was shuddering, wracking with his sobs, even as he began unbuttoning the front of his daddy's robes. His fingers were badly shaking, but he finally got enough of them open so that he could squeeze his way inside them._

At least that explained how the child had gotten into his robes.

" _I'm your SLOB daddy—your small lump of boy—that's what you c-c-called me daddy. Remember Daddy? Remember? I'm your SLOB! I'm not your freak or your idiot or your w-w-worthless piece of sh-sh-shit," his mouth quivered wildly._

Unable to watch anymore, Severus pulled himself from his son's memories with a small cry, his eyes burning in response to the emotions his child had spilled over his prone figure.

"You will _never_ be a freak or an idiot to me- _never!_ " Severus bit out roughly, once again furious over the cruel entities of his son's miserable past.

"But you didn't wake up," his child said in a dim voice from where it was muffled up against his chest.

"And if I could just make myself n-n-not care, then maybe it wouldn't hurt so much," his son said with another shuddering sob-like breath.

"Hush," Severus said in a hoarse voice, pulling the boy up and wrapping his arms tightly around his smaller form—just as he had wanted the older man to do before.

"You don't mean that," he whispered knowingly to the small head tucked under his chin.

"But I _do_. I can't—I don't want—I mean," the child argued incomprehensively back against him before being hushed once more by Severus.

"You don't want it to hurt anymore," Severus whispered, closing his eyes against the golden light of the new day; his mind thinking back upon the demons of his own past.

"And maybe if you didn't let yourself feel anything, then it wouldn't hurt. Am I correct?" Severus asked gently.

"Then it wouldn't _matter_ if you—if you _died_ ," his child stated, before being wracked with a pain filled sob that Severus felt as well.

"But it would, wouldn't it? Even if I _had_ died, your life would still be different than it was _before_ ," Severus whispered in a deep voice to his son who was shaking from within his embrace.

"Not if I got sent back to the Dursleys!" His child cried out, admitting his fear out loud, while trying to clench his body down against the surge of fear currently trying to work its way through his muscles.

"You will _not_ be sent back to them. I promised you that; do you not remember?" Severus swore vehemently to himself, railing internally against such vile creatures as those who still dared to plague his son's nightmares.

"If you died, then Dumbledore could have done anything he damn well pleased with me!" His son's voice cracked with emotion as he spoke earnestly of the bitter truths of his past.

He could feel the two fists wrapped tightly in his shirtfront as his child fought against the fear, against what he thought he knew of the reality that surrounded his small world.

"If he had tried to do anything of the sort, he would have had to fight through a host of others to do so," Severus all but snarled, imagining the chaos that would likely result should the need ever come about.

"No one fought for me before!" Lee said, falling against Severus's chest; his shoulders slumping in his defeat.

"No one ever bothered," he whispered in a deathly still voice. "They were all dead or gone. Just like you'll be; just like Poppy—no one will be left to fight Dumbledore or Lucius for me. They'll just take me and take me and—," he broke off with a sob, even as Severus lifted him up out of his robes to look him in the eye.

"What kind of Slytherin do you take me for?" Severus bit out fiercely, desperate to try and break through the miserable walls that his son was building around himself.

"Well?" Severus demanded of his son, when the child still wouldn't respond.

"The best," Lee whispered; his face damp with tears that continued to fall unchecked.

"You listen to me, _Mr_. _Snape_ ," Severus answered in his deepest voice, putting his son back down to rest on his chest once more. He noted with approval as his boy continued to stare wide-eyed back up at him, waiting to hear what he had to say.

"I wouldn't be where I am today if I hadn't planned ahead. I make plans for all possible outcomes, and for you, that includes a few scenarios that I'm almost positive will never occur," he said, taking his son's chin in his hand and looking sternly down at the child who had stolen his heart.

"There is a list of no less than _fifty_ people—wizards and muggles alike—who are in line to take care of you should something happen to me. Not _only_ does this list include Poppy and Kingsley, but it also includes nearly the entire faculty of Hogwarts! From there continues a list of people whom I know to be stout hearted individuals—most of whom owe me a life debt or two," he stated completely seriously.

" _Furthermore_ , if it seems necessary to do so, I _myself_ will come back and claim you!" He said, speaking with intensity to the small quivering child whom he had chosen to always love and protect.

"Even as a ghost, Dad?" His son looked on at him in near shock, his eyes still not blinking.

"If there's a chance of you being hurt, then I'll damn well come back as a bloody _poltergeist_ ," he growled, pressing his forehead against his son's.

"Understand me?"

He waited for the lad to nod before leaning back up against the pillows.

"Good," he said tiredly, looking at his son lovingly.


	58. Incendio Noxum

The next day, to Severus's utmost relief, Poppy agreed to allow him to go back to the safety of his quarters.

 _And it had only taken Kingsley an hour and a half of wheedling to make it happen too,_ he thought with a smirk.

It seemed that he and his lover had taken much opposite paths after graduating from Hogwarts.

Apparently, while he had been off gallivanting and performing nefarious tasks for the Death Eaters—Poppy's words—Kingsley had instead been fastidiously working his way through an apprenticeship for none other than the same formidable woman. Eventually, he had gone on to become certified in the healing arts, but had ultimately changed his plans for being a regular healer; after having decided that, with the rise of Voldemort and the accompanying chaos that had wrought in the wizarding community, his skills would be put to better use as an auror.

Thus, Poppy had released Severus into Kingsley's care, but only after she had given the larger man a stiff warning that she was to be kept appraised of all developments—mundane or otherwise.

Severus had left the infirmary by way of Poppy's floo; his SLOB perched securely on one hip as he did—much to the dismay of those watching him.

"Severus, you are too weak to be doing such a thing! For Merlin's sake, give him to Kingsley before you hurt yourself! Or better yet, put him down and let him walk on his own. He's nearly a teenager!" Minerva had protested, loudest of all.

But Severus had chosen not to waste his diminished energy arguing with her or the rest, and instead had continued walking until he was finally standing in the blessed relief of his own home.

Besides, his son was wrapped so tightly around him that he really didn't have to worry about holding onto the boy anyways. Lee's legs were clasped tensely around his waist, with both hands fisted securely in the material of his robes. The child was _not_ in danger of falling down.

It was a thought that made him smirk for a moment, before the floo roared to life once more behind him, propelling Kingsley forwards into his quarters.

"I hope you hexed the old bat," Severus said with just the hint of a snarl.

"Now Severus," Kingsley answered in a cajoling tone. His dark face was somber, but the corner of his mouth twitched, revealing his amusement.

Severus renewed his smirk, before striding off towards his bedroom. The excitement of getting out of the infirmary had fueled his movements for the past few minutes, but now that he was once again safely ensconced in his quarters, he could feel that false energy quickly wearing off.

He sat down on the bed with a thump— _and not a moment too soon_ , he thought with a relieved internal sigh.

Kingsley joined him a moment later, pressing a soft kiss upon his cheek as did so.

"I'm taking a nap," the other man said wearily. Severus could see clearly enough that Kingsley was exhausted, and he silently wondered whether his lover had slept any while he had been in the infirmary.

"Well, I certainly wouldn't want you to be lonely while you do so. Perhaps I should join you," Severus said, trying to sound magnanimous about it.

"Bah, you're about to fall over too," Kingsley shot back with a grin, before scooting backwards on the bed. Severus noted with approval that he had already removed his shoes.

Severus cocked an eyebrow at his words, but the other man took no notice of it. Instead, he opened his arms and gestured with his fingers towards Severus.

"Come on Severus; _Lee_ is already asleep. It's high time we joined him," Kingsley said, smiling at Severus in a way that filled his chest with heat.

Severus looked down at the small boy still attached to him, cracking a small grin as he did so. Then, after quickly shedding his own shoes—Lee was only wearing socks—he moved backwards into his lover's warm arms.

And then it was just softness and safety wrapped together in darkness, and shortly thereafter their little trio was fast asleep.

. . .

Neville peered through the narrow length of glass that showed the inside of yet another private room set at the back of the infirmary. It was the window that made this room appealing; simply because it was the only one that _had_ one.

He quickly realized that the room wasn't anything special; at least in comparison to whom the _occupant_ was.

" _Ron_ ," he whispered in surprise as his eyes caught sight of the sleeping Weasley boy.

He had kept his word to Kingsley about not eavesdropping anymore, but _looking_ was hardly the same thing, right?

 _Right_ , he thought nervously to himself, before backing off from the door and quickly making his way back down the deserted corridor.

Neville glanced out the first window he came to, and noticed with relief that the sky was still dark. Draco had been deeply asleep, barely moving, when he had left their room a short while ago. He had woken with a feeling of restlessness, and had only gone out into the hall in order to walk some of that nervous energy off.

He hadn't intended to keep walking, and he certainly hadn't thought he'd find Ron by doing so.

Neville wondered whether he could get away with visiting him.

Furthermore, he wondered if he even really wanted to anymore.

. . .

Lee awoke secure and warm in his father's arms. The darkness behind his eyelids was no longer as black as it had been, and when he opened his eyes, he quickly discovered why.

"Good afternoon, young Mr. Snape," Kingsley said with a blurry smile.

The man was upright with his back to the headboard; a tiny lit orb resting on his shoulder, while a book of some kind rested on his lap.

"Would you like your glasses?" Kingsley asked him when the boy didn't respond.

"Please," Lee said; his voice barely above a whisper.

After checking to see if his father was still asleep—he was—Lee looked back up at the formidable man sitting beside them.

"Aren't you worried about waking Dad up?" He asked in that same almost whisper.

Kingsley chuckled at his question before answering.

"There's not much danger of that. He's pretty worn out."

Lee didn't like the sound of that.

"He's going to be all right though, isn't he? That's what Poppy said," Lee countered quickly. He waited for Kingsley's answer from where he was still laid out atop his father; the man's arms still tightly wrapped around his back.

"He'll be fine," the big man said reassuringly. "He's just exhausted from having to fight the curse off."

Lee was silent for a moment, and Kingsley waited for him to speak.

"What curse did he get hit with? No one would tell me," he asked inquisitively.

"It was an old curse called _incendio noxum."_

"What does that mean?"

"Roughly translated, it means 'to burn the darkness,'" the big man answered seriously.

"Why did it hurt dad so much then?" Lee asked worriedly.

"When it was first invented, it was meant not as a curse, but rather as a type of cleansing spell meant to remove the taint of dark magic from an object."

"When you say 'object,' you mean like nonliving things?" Lee's eyes were wide.

"Yes. You see, during Grindelwald's time, those individuals on Dumbledore's side were desperate to find as many ways as possible to fight back against him and his forces," Kingsley paused. He had not failed to notice the Lee's flinch as he spoke the headmaster's name, but decided not to press the matter for now.

"So someone found the spell and used it? Against Grindelwald's side?" Lee asked with a horrorstruck expression.

"Yes, and in doing so, they proved once again that there is no pure concept of black and white, or good and evil, within battle—or anywhere else, really," Kingsley explained, muttering the last part mostly under his breath.

"Voldemort is evil," Lee said with a snarl.

"But was he always? Was he _born_ evil?" Kingsley looked at him in a way that made him uncomfortable, and he turned his head away in an effort to get away from the man's searching gaze.

"I dunno," he answered with a small shrug after it seemed that Kingsley was still waiting for his response.

"Think on it sometime, and I think you'll see what I mean," the dark skinned man said gently.

They lapsed into silence again. Lee put his ear down on Severus's chest and listened to the steady drum of his heartbeat for a while before looking back up towards his father's boyfriend.

"Why did dad call you 'Kay'?" He asked, changing the subject somewhat.

"Back in the infirmary?"

Lee nodded.

"Just a nickname he gave me some years ago. He said that if he had to put up with me calling him Sev, then I was giving him free reign to come up with something equally ridiculous," Kingsley answered slowly, his eyes distant with the memory.

Lee giggled.

 _Yup, that sounds like something dad would say,_ he thought to himself with a smirk.

A moment later, he felt his buoyant mood abruptly deflate as he thought of another question to ask.

"Kingsley, how is it that Warrington knew the spell to begin with? It sounds like it wasn't ever that widely known to begin with, right?"

"You're correct. It's not very well known at all."

"So how'd that Slytherin kid know it?" Lee asked again when the man didn't answer his question.

He watched as Kingsley ran a hand over the top of his bald head; clearly thinking of how best to answer his question.

"Warrington's grandfather was part of Grindewald's army. He was one of the few to survive the casting of the curse," the man answered slowly.

Lee shuddered and held onto his father that much tighter.

"What happened to him?" He asked in a small voice.

Kingsley looked away from him before he answered.

"Madness is what happened to him," the man answered in a somber voice.

"And then?" Lee had his father's robes in a death grip.

"And then upon his return from the battlefield, he proceeded to murder most of his family, before cutting his own throat at the end," Kingsley's eyes were shut as he finished the tale.

 _He knew what could happen and he still cast the curse at Severus?_ The thought that someone could hate _that_ much was absolutely terrifying. It was just like hearing Lucius's motives all over again, but worse, because Warrington was only a few years older than him.

Lee's breath hitched with the memory and he pushed his face into his dad's robes. His chest hurt and he couldn't get enough air, causing his chest to constrict in pain.

In his distress, he didn't notice being pulled closer until his dad was already speaking in his ear.

"Breathe little one, breathe," Severus soothed, rubbing circles into the child's back. Severus sat up with the boy in his arms, leaning against the headboard just beside his lover.

"I take it that you told him about the curse?" Severus asked, raising an eyebrow at the contrite looking man beside him.

"He wanted to know," Kingsley answered resignedly.

"Next time he wants to know something, wake me up _first_ ," Severus answered tiredly.

. . .

"How could he do it dad? Why did he try to hurt you like that, even though he knew what would happen?" Lee whispered sometime later from within the man's arms.

"You mean Warrington?" Severus asked.

A small head nodded against his chest, while bright green eyes stared up at him.

"Knowledge is merely theory until it is put to use, son," Severus said contemplatively; his fingers continuing to rub soothing circles into his child's tense back.

The lad was quiet for a long time after he answered, clearly thinking about what he had said.

"Do y'think that the Dursleys knew what they were doing to me?" The boy asked finally, looking back up at Severus with pained eyes.

Severus felt his chest constrict miserably at his son's question, and from the corner of his eye he could see Kingsley peering at them with a questioning look on his face.

"I believe that your relatives were deluded in their plans of how best to raise you," Severus answered hoarsely, as he tried to keep his venomous comments to himself.

He knew that Lee would not be any better off after hearing what he really thought about the vicious creatures that had "raised" his son prior to their time together.

"'Cause they hated me," Lee added glumly, curling up into his SLOB position within Severus's lap.

"Because they are _fools_ ," Severus snarled out into the darkness of his room.

Severus felt Kingsley's arm as it reached out over his shoulders, drawing him into the slightly larger man's chest.

"What did they do to him?" Kingsley asked then, softly interjecting into the moment. Severus saw concern shining brightly out of his lover's eyes, but shook his head with a glance towards his child; indicating that he could not speak of it while his son was so upset.

"Little SLOB, what am I to do with you?" He asked the small lump of boy curled tightly against his chest.

"Just toss me in cupboard and lock me away," Lee muttered, sniffling softly.

Severus's eyes narrowed sharply at the child's response; while Kingsley looked at them both in clear and evident shock.

"Are you a book? Or an old pair of shoes? Perhaps you are really a broomstick in disguise," Severus asked with a snort of derision.

His son rubbed his face up and down Severus's shirt as he did whenever he was agitated, before replying.

"Am not an old pair of shoes," the boy said in an indignant voice; his lower lip sticking out ever so slightly.

"Perhaps he is a set of potions ingredients," Kingsley added; nodding his head ever so slightly in Severus's direction.

"I'm not a set of potion ingredients, Kingsley!" The boy turned his head and stuck his tongue out at the large man.

"I don't know Kay; you may have a point there. After all, tongue is a valuable catalyst in some upper level potions," Severus said with a look down at his son. Lee quickly put his tongue back in his mouth at that.

"Well he certainly isn't a pet; one doesn't keep _pets_ in _cupboards_ ," Kingsley responded with a grimace that Lee missed, since he was back to hiding his face in Severus's robes.

"'Am a boy, dad. Tell him, dad," his son looked up at him with a pleading look in his eyes.

"Ah, but we don't keep _boys_ in _cupboards_ ," Severus answered in a stern voice.

"Dursleys did," his son answered quietly.

"What about that large whale-like cousin of yours? As I recall, he's a boy, is he not?" Severus asked, his lips curling in distaste. "Was he also kept in a _cupboard_?"

His son shook his head in the negative. Severus noticed that his child once more had his arms around his knees and had begun to burrow into the space between his side and his arm.

"You say that the Dursleys kept boys in cupboards, but it seems to me that the only one they kept there was _you_ ," Severus said gently, wrapping his arms tightly around his tense son.

"Is that true, Lee?" Kingsley asked in a slow voice.

Lee paused before nodding his head up and down several times in the affirmative.

"And no one ever stopped them?" Kingsley asked, speaking again in that same calm voice.

Severus watched as his son jerkily shook his head back and forth. Lee's eyes had begun to look suspiciously wet as he stared determinedly at the bedspread beside him.

"Other than keeping you in a cupboard, did they do anything else that you didn't like?" Kingsley asked, somehow maneuvering a hand in-between Severus's arms to touch the boy lightly on his arm.

Lee paused again, and then jerked his head up and down in the affirmative before glancing up at his father. Blinking his eyes furiously, his son looked up at him with a questioningly look on his face, while Kingsley waited patiently beside them.

"You may tell him, little one," Severus said, stroking his son's soft hair lightly with his fingertips.

His son shook his head back and forth, his lower lip trembling as he pushed his face into Severus's shoulder.

"Can you tell him, Daddy?" The little muffled voice of his son asked in a desperately tiny sounding voice.

"Would you like me to?"

"Yes, please," his son's voice said, still managing to quiver; even though his face was still firmly pushed against Severus's shoulder.

Severus could feel little fists being made in the front of his robes as he pulled his son up flush against him. Now that the boy's face was pressed into the top of his shoulder, near his neck, Severus could also hear the little whimpers that the boy had previously been hiding in the cloth of his robes.

Wordlessly, the dark haired potions professor summoned a vial of calming potion to his hand from the cabinet across the room. It seemed that whenever he was particularly worried for his son, his wandless magic was substantially easier.

"Son?" He requested, unstoppering the vial and gently turning the boy's head away from the safe seclusion of his shoulder for a moment.

His son swallowed the potion quickly before turning his head back into Severus's chest.

Severus felt the small fists releasing as the potion began working. A moment later, he felt his son's arms come up and wrap around his neck and back; likewise, he also felt the child's limbs begin to relax against him. However, perhaps most comforting of all, his son stopped making those little pained sounds that had been driving little bolts of pain straight into the dark haired man's heart.

"Dad?" The child asked in a substantially more relaxed voice a few minutes later.

"Child?"

"I'm not a pair of old shoes," his son said, pulling his face away from Severus's shoulder to look at him sternly.

From beside them, Severus heard Kingsley begin chuckling, and was hard pressed not to join him.

"Of course not," Severus said instead; shooting his lover a dirty look as the man continued to snicker.

"I'm just a boy. Right, dad?" There was a faint trace of uncertainty in the child's eyes this time; something that Kingsley also caught as he abruptly went silent beside them.

"Not just any boy, Lee; you're _my_ boy," Severus said, pressing a kiss onto his son's forehead.

Lee smiled at the affirmation and allowed Severus to pull him back up against his chest.

"See Kingsley?" The boy added sleepily as Severus began to give the larger man the full details of the abuse his child had suffered at the hands of lunatic muggles.

"Just Sev'rus's boy," the child muttered softly a moment later; causing an idiotic grin to appear on Severus's face that Kingsley wisely ignored.

. . .

Deep in a ministry holding cell, Marcus Flint was waiting for something to happen. He'd been sitting there for what had felt like _days_ , while the Ministry pricks tried to get their act together.

Now, at long last, it seemed that the time had come.

"Get up little bitch," a voice called out to him from the gated doorway, barely giving him a moment to comply before hexing him painfully. He was barely aware as the aurors picked up by his arms and began dragging him down the hallway. They had gone down three hallways and up two flights before he finally had regained the ability to walk on his own.

The seventeen year old Slytherin was no stranger to sudden and undeserved pain. His father was—or _had been,_ he thought with a mental roll of his eyes—a death eater back in the heyday of the dark lord's ruling years. The man was not above torturing his own son with the same curses that the death eaters had previously used on helpless muggles.

"Just keepin' in practice, m'boy," the man would growl unpleasantly at him; leering unpleasantly at him with a lewd smile upon his lips.

If Flint were lucky, he'd just get beaten black and blue and then left alone to heal on his own. If he wasn't—well, things were a lot worse for a lot longer. Consequently, as he had grown older, he had learned how to keep away from home as much as possible.

They arrived at a rather nondescript door and pulled him inside roughly. The two aurors were both large muscular men whom he knew he had never seen before, but in comparison with how his father often was, they were practically being _gentle_ with him.

He sneered at the thought.

 _Bastards_ , _the lot of 'em_ , he thought angrily, as they planted him none too gently in a hard chair in the middle of the room. Almost instantaneously, ropes sprung up from the floor around him, tying him rather effectively in place. They were almost too tight to breathe around, but he didn't bother to let on about his discomfort to the men beside him.

_What was the point anyways?_

The room was inky black around them, and he quickly realized that the only light came from the wands of the men themselves.

 _Slytherins are not afraid of the dark; Slytherins are not afraid of the dark_ , he chanted in his head as they waited for whatever was supposed to happen.

"You're not a Slytherin anymore, Marcus," the voice snapped him out of his stupor, even as the surprising figure walked into the dim light surrounding him.

"How did—?" He started to say before deciding just to keep his mouth shut.

"You would have done best to do that from the beginning, _Marcus_ ," the figure said, walking lightly around him. Flint turned his head in vain as he tried to keep track of where they had gone.

A hand touched him lightly on his other shoulder and he twitched, the ropes jerking with him, pulling tighter across his chest as a result.

"Why are _you_ here?" He sneered, unconsciously doing an impression of his former head of house.

"I could ask you the same question, _Marcus_ ," they said, beginning to annoy the teen with their casual use of his first name.

 _Only my friends call me that_ , he thought angrily, glaring at the figure in front of him.

"And your professors call you Flint; I know," the person said with a smirk.

He wanted to hit that smirk. He wanted to—his thoughts were cut off as the ropes pulled tighter for a brief instance, before releasing him back to his former level of binding.

"Marcus, Marcus," the person tutted, turning their back on _him,_ as though he were no threat to them at all.

He snarled at the figure, but they didn't react. Instead, they spoke again.

"Really _Marcus,_ if your professors had hit you every time you sneered at them, you simply wouldn't have lived this long," the figure said, turning back around and staring coldly back at him.

"Then I guess I should be happy then that you're not my _professor,_ Madam _Pomfrey_ ," he growled at the small, yet surprisingly imposing figure standing before him.


	59. Just a Bit of Revenge

Neville could remember the day of the fight in Professor Snape's potions classroom with more clarity than most would have suspected. At first he had been uncertain of whether or not he could trust his recollection of what had happened, but after witnessing many more insane atrocities _following_ that fight, he could not help but believe his memories.

He was now certain that Ron had done something to Lee in the darkness shortly before leaving. Furthermore, he was almost completely certain that it was something lewd; a theory which was later reinforced when he found out just what exactly had happened to Ron while he was missing.

Now all he needed to find out was what exactly happened between him and Draco to cause such a ruckus that day in the first place.

Neville couldn't ask Draco. His communication skills still weren't back up to par and neither was his memory.

On the other hand, even if he managed to visit Ron without getting caught—or in trouble—he'd almost certainly have to bring Draco along for safe keeping, and who knew what kind of chaos might come as a result of _that_ decision?

 _Or maybe it might be good for them to see each other,_ he thought with a small grimace.

Thus, that was why he and Draco found themselves standing outside the door to Ron's room the very next day. Really, Neville had only planned on looking in, but after a moment of doing that and seeing that no new answers were forthcoming, he decided to go ahead and take the forwards plunge. After taking a deep breath and releasing it slowly, Neville nodded to himself and opened the door—Draco following closely behind him.

. . .

Healer Turnskell looked up in some surprise as two young boys suddenly walked into the young patient's room. He opened his mouth to say something, but closed it again just as suddenly; realizing rather abruptly that this could be a momentous event in the progression of the young Weasley child.

Hogwarts had continued to amaze him, with all of its fortuitous events and spectacular finds; and he felt that it would be an intrusion on his part to further tamper with the wishes of fate.

. . .

Ron watched the door to his room open and felt his breath catch in his throat as he saw the unlikely pair that walked through. He hadn't seen either since that fateful day in the Potion's classroom, and now—after all that he had been through—he wasn't sure if he could even face one of them, let alone both at the same time.

"Hello Ron," Neville said, breaking through the thick cotton that seemed to be frequently wrapped around Ron's mind. The other boy's voice sounded strained, and he was struck with a feeling of utter helplessness at the coldness that had grown between them in the time that he had been gone.

"Hullo," Ron answered in a hoarse voice a short time later. He couldn't find it within himself to look up at them now; instead staring rather resolutely down at his nondescript bedcovers.

More uncomfortable silence reigned between them, until finally being broken once more by Neville.

"You hurt him, didn't you."

It wasn't a question, and Ron didn't have to ask whom Neville had made the comment about.

_As though I'll ever be able to forget such a thing! My own best mate, I can't believe that I touched him—fondled him, even._

After _beating him to a bloody pulp_ , his inner voice added on petulantly.

He hated himself.

Still not looking up, Ron nodded in response to Neville's statement. His eyes had begun tearing up, but he blinked them away furiously. He hated that he had been so horrible, and he hated that the mess that he had gotten himself into. Furthermore, he hated himself for not putting up a better fight when he had been raped—any of the times, but especially the first time with Draco.

And now Draco had been hurt, and he couldn't help but feel responsible for that as well. After all, he had violently choked him, and—he couldn't think anymore. It was all so muddled in his mind now. His internal timeline no longer seemed to work, and the only person he could blame was himself.

He wasn't aware that he was shaking until he felt the healer's hand on his shoulder. He jerked away from the man's touch and curled up in a ball next to the wall. He shoved his hand in his mouth to stifle his sob, and in turn was reminded of a time earlier that year where he had done the very same thing, outside in the dark by himself.

"You hurt me," a soft voice said, breaking through his misery memories.

"You hurt me," he answered, just as softly; choosing not to look at the blond haired menace crouched on the floor near Neville.

"And your d—," his throat closed down on the word, "dad." Dad's were men like Arthur Weasley; maybe even people like Snape. Conversely, Lucius Malfoy was not even _remotely_ a "dad" type.

"And your f-f-father hurt me," Ron finally managed to finish, deigning to shoot a glance at the younger Malfoy as he fell back into silence.

"I know," Draco answered back in a near whisper.

A moment later, a quiet sob broke through the room's emptiness, surprising Ron when he realized that it had not come from himself. He looked over at Draco once again just in time to see the blond haired boy repeat the miserable sound.

"He hurt me too," the blond boy then choked out in a gravelly sounding voice.

"He hurt me, and he hurt me, and I screamed, and I b-b-begged him," a shamefaced Draco cried out in a rush of words. "But he wouldn't stop, he wouldn't stop, he—," the boy's words were hushed abruptly as Neville pulled Draco's face into his shoulder.

Ron continued to be shocked as he watched Draco grab onto the other boy and weep freely before them all.

Reality shifted once more before the room came sharply into focus as Ron realized that he was not the only one who had been broken that year.

. . .

Severus's day started out in a typical way. He was roused from his deep sleep by the sounds of desperate screams, prompting a hasty removal of himself from bed—and Kingsley's warm arms, more often than not—before propelling himself across the hallway to face the origin of those needy cries.

It had been like this nearly every day since he had been released from the infirmary, and if truth were to be told, it was beginning to cause him more than a little distress as his worries about his son increased with each horrific nightmare.

A second later and he had the child in his arms, soothing him with and without words, as he tried to gently pull the boy towards the waking world.

"Hush little one, hush," he murmured over the lad's unconscious tears, rubbing his back with one hand and cradling him to his chest with the other.

And finally, a wakeful state would dawn once more with one little question that never ceased to make Severus's heart clench.

"Daddy?" Came the hitching voice of his son from within Severus's warm arms.

Severus pressed his lips to the boy's clammy forehead before answering; taking advantage of the brief pause that the action elicited in order to gather some of his wits back around him.

"Yes, child?" He answered.

"I woke you up again?" Was the boy's tearful inquiry.

"In a manner of speaking," Severus admitted; choosing not to say anything on how the child's screams nearly stopped his heart every time they reached his ears.

"But I am thankful that I could be here for you," Severus continued, as he correctly realized that his son was trying to muster together an apology for him.

 _One step forwards, three steps back,_ he chanted silently to himself, remembering the conversation he had had with Turnskell over this very possibility.

" _After removing an abused child from his or her home—and I use that term very lightly, Severus—they will continue to grow, learn and adapt in many ways similar to typical children. However, they will continue to have setbacks that will likely affect them more harshly than a typical child would in their stead."_

" _Given their history of unpleasant situations, it is not as easy for them to bounce back from negative stimuli; especially when one takes into account that the majority of their experiences are so much the same. Remember that for every step forwards that Lee takes, he will often take two or three steps backwards as well; something that causes progress to become a damnable and mystifying thing in the eyes of many new guardians,"_ the older healer had somberly warned him _._

Lee still continued to shake within his arms and he silently cursed the people who had caused the nightmares to begin with.

"Are you cold Lee?" He asked, knowing that the answer was not nearly so simple a thing.

"N-no, maybe—I don't know," the boy said miserably between bouts of nearly painful full body shakes.

Silently he wrapped the child's comforter around them both and leaned back into the charmed softness of the wall, silently thanking Jimmy as he did so.

"I am worried about you little one," he said, speaking gently to the child who was now tightly wrapped around him.

His son's body hitched with a half-concealed sob, and he mentally pushed back the helpless rise of anger that he felt within him at the reasons for their situation.

"I'm too much trouble, I know," the boy's voice quavered.

"Hardly," Severus shot him a glare that he softened with a roll of his eyes and a dramatic sigh.

"You have nothing on a Hufflepuff during a full panic attack," he added with a small smirk that his son smiled tearfully at.

"I bet Slytherins don't ever freak out though, do they?" Lee looked at him carefully.

He snorted aloud at the question, thinking back on the many times that he had witnessed the exact thing from Slytherin students of all ages.

"Oh trust me, Slytherins most definitely wig out," Kingsley's voice interjected into their awareness.

Severus shot him a grateful nod for not using the word, "freak;" while trying to hide the fact that the man had completely caught him unawares with his sudden presence in the room.

"Really?" Lee turned his head to the side and squinted out at Kingsley with skeptical eyes.

The man gave a deep chuckle before answering that he had personally witnessed such a thing, not once, but several times over the course of his life.

"They just tend to be a bit more private about it, Lee," the big man had finally concluded with a smile towards Severus.

"What Kay means, Lee," Severus quickly added, seeing the remorseful look come back over his son's face, "is that Slytherins will only show extreme emotional states around people whom they _trust_ ," he finished with a pointed look at first his son and then at his lover.

"Oh," his son said, relaxing enough to lean against Severus's chest.

. . .

Kingsley stood on the manicured lawn facing #4 Privet Drive with a look of utter contempt on his otherwise handsome face. It was early the next morning; barely half past three, but Kingsley was wide awake with the knowledge of what he needed to do that day.

In his line of business, he had been called in to deal with abusive families far more often than he would have liked, and while some had been disturbing cases, none quite managed to measure up to the destructive and abusive nature of the muggles who had been charged with the upbringing of one Harry James Potter.

He had used a Notice-Me-Not charm on himself before coming here; not for the dignity of the Dursleys, but rather to avoid any tedious muggle-wizard relations paperwork that might come about from his work there that day.

After taking a deep breath to calm himself, he started up the walk that led to the front door of the Dursley's house.

Not bothering to knock, he let himself into the house with a quietly spoken _alohomora_ , before quickly making his way through the room. He knew that it would not help him keep his sense of fragile calm, but he couldn't seem to deny himself the urge to see this "cupboard" that Lee mentioned in his distress the previous day.

He could feel the cupboard and its dark energies before he ever arrived at the spot within the house. The air around the space burned in his lungs and he grimaced at the amount of pain that the child had clearly suffered here.

He pulled out a vial of healing potion along with a small cup. He began muttering the words to an old spell while he poured some of the potion into the cup, before closing it back up and putting it back into one of the inside pockets of his robe.

After dipping his fingertip into the cup, he began using it to draw a series of runes on the outside of the cupboard door. When he was finished and the cup was empty, he placed it back inside his robes as well and pulled out his wand.

Touching his wand to one of the barely visible runes, he put the magic into place with two words: "Show me."

The room swirled around him as the house's memory sought to do just that. Meanwhile, above him, the house's occupants fell into a deeply enchanted sleep, not to wake again until after he had left them.

. . .

Lee was walking down the hallway, heading towards the dungeons to his father's—rather, _their_ quarters, when he heard the sound of footsteps behind him.

Swallowing hard, he put his hand on his wand and then turned around to face whoever it was.

" _Expelliarmus!_ " He heard, before feeling his wand being ripped out of his hand.

He watched in helplessness as his soon to be attackers casually threw it down the hall behind them.

"Dean? Kenneth?" He exclaimed in surprise.

"Hey Snakey," Dean cooed at him in a sing-songy voice. Next to him, the larger fourth year Gryffindor leered at him; looking frighteningly similar to how Lucius always smiled in his nightmares.

It was that cold look that made Lee's heart begin beating faster, pounding loudly in his ears as he tried to remain calm.

"What do you want?" Lee asked, cursing himself as his voice came out in little more than a whisper.

Dean walked right up to him and stared angrily into his face.

"You really shouldn't be allowed to keep wearing those robes, Snakey. People might start thinking you were a Gryffindor or something," he said in a low voice.

Responding to the venom in the second year's voice, Lee involuntarily took a step backwards, only to find himself flush against the cold stone wall.

"I _am_ a Gryffindor," he argued half-heartedly—knowing all too well that he was walking directly into their trap with his words.

"Yeah right, _Snape_ ," Kenneth added with a derisive snort, as he continued to loom next to him.

"Noticed you've been doing better in Potions lately, Snakey," Dean said, continuing on after the other boy had finished speaking.

"I've been studying a lot more lately," he answered softly, his eyes wide with fear. He could feel sweat trickling down his back, and he prayed that they didn't notice.

"Dean told me that Snape awarded _you_ points," Kenneth growled, slapping his hand on the wall just over Lee's head. He flinched at the suddenness of the sound, causing both Gryffindors to smirk at him.

"Snape doesn't ever _award_ Gryffindor points," Kenneth continued in a deep voice.

 _He awarded them to Neville too_ , Lee thought in silent rebellion.

"Here's what I think, _Snakey_ ," Dean said, poking a finger into Lee's sternum with a sharp jab.

Lee tried not to make a face at the pain that action elicited in his chest.

"I think this whole adoption scenario is one big _fucking_ lie," Dean said, his eyes glittering darkly.

Lee didn't like the way that Dean had spoken, _"fucking."_

"I can't believe you were so _desperate_ to get ahead in Snape's class," Dean said, spraying spittle at Lee.

"W-What do you m-m-mean?" He asked hesitantly, not at all sure he wanted to hear the other boy's answer.

"Tell me Lee," Dean said, straightening back up and looking him coolly in the eye.

"The first time you blew him, did you do it voluntarily? Or did he have to make you?"

After what felt like an eternity of silence, Lee managed to get out a word.

"W-What?"

Not swayed by his flabbergasted response, Dean asked another question.

"Did he return the favor?" The two boys staring at him snickered cruelly as his breath caught in his throat.

"How can you say _t-that_? How can you even _suggest_ that?" Lee was staring at them in near shock, his fists clenched and trembling at his sides.

"As I was telling Kenneth here, I heard some of those dreams you had earlier this year," Dean said with a sneer.

A cold feeling washed through him as though someone had just filled his guts with ice.

" _Oh Merlin, that feels so_ _good,"_ Dean said, emphasizing the sentence with little thrusts of his hips in Lee's direction.

Lee felt sick with his once-friend's words. Memories jumped unbidden to his mind's eye as he recalled with hideous clarity the actions that Lucius had committed against his person.

At the same time, Dean's accusations also filled his ears, and he could feel anger bubbling up in his chest at the things the other boy had said against his father— _his_ _protector_.

"You take that back!" Lee yelled, gripping Dean by the front of his robes and pushing him away from himself hard.

Kenneth responded for his friend by grabbing Lee around the neck and shoving him back into the stone wall with a loud THUMP.

Lee grunted in pain and frustration as Dean laughed openly at him.

"I bet the greasy git just slides right in, doesn't he!" Both boys laughed at their own wit.

Kenneth no longer had his meaty hand around Lee's neck, but he still felt as though he were choking as he listened to the vitriol spewing from his housemate's mouths.

Suddenly the laughter stopped and Lee realized that they were both looking at him appraisingly.

Lee kept his mouth shut this time, knowing better than to fight against the large arm that still had him pinned. The lessons in defense and self-control from Severus were really starting to kick in now as he made himself continue to wait for an opportunity to fight back; even as his insides continued to squirm with angry disgust.

"Ever fucked a snake, Dean?" Kenneth asked suddenly with a frightening look that made Lee's stomach flop.

"How'd you do that?" The other boy asked in an amused sounding voice.

"Cut out its fangs and jammed my dick down its throat," Kenneth answer with a cruel smirk down at Lee.

Lee let out a short gasp that he quickly silenced. Then he felt two hands pushing down on his shoulders, and he couldn't help but shriek aloud.

"NO!" He shouted, fighting against the two boys who had him outnumbered.

Dean slapped him viciously across the face, and Kenneth punched him hard in the stomach. It was the second injury that caused him to lose his balance long enough for them to throw him to his knees harshly. Dimly, he heard the crack of his shins as they struck down against the stone hallway, and he saw a large hand reach for his head.

He jerked backwards, but only succeeded in smashing the back of his head against the stones of the wall once more.

A rough hand touched his face and something inside himself snapped; causing the outer edges of the world around him to fade to a murky red haze.

As though in a dream, he faintly heard another voice outside of himself yelling something, but he couldn't focus on it, as he was so very intent on hurting the two monsters in front of him.

The torches in the hallway flickered once, and then twice, before a great whorl of energy burst from his outstretched fists. Abruptly, time jumped forwards a few frames, and he saw himself looking down at the sprawled unconscious heap of Dean Thomas. He idly noted that there were burn marks on the other boy's cheeks, but couldn't bring himself to care.

A great wind was building in the hallway around him, as the months of fear, frustration and anger finally seemed to catch up with him.

He heard a sound to the right of him and he spun around to see Kenneth Towler lumbering towards him, a wand clasped tightly in his meaty fist.

"Leave me _ALONE!_ " He shrieked out at the fourth year.

The wind, as if listening to his bidding, redoubled in fury, throwing itself with an angry howl towards the suddenly frightened looking Gryffindor boy.

The violent tornado extinguished the lights just as it brought Kenneth down for good, allowing Lee to see something terrifying as the other boy glared at him before losing consciousness.

Kenneth Towler's eyes glowed green in the sudden darkness, exactly the way that Ron's eyes had done.

Lee blindly reached out for the wall beside him, before sliding to the floor with a soft sob, pulling his knees to his chest with a painful sounding whimper.

For once, unconsciousness refused to claim him; leaving him alone with his frightened tears.


	60. Another

"Lumos," Theodore Nott muttered to himself as he walked carefully towards the small, bent figure that was still crying piteously before him.

He had caught the end of the fight between the two Gryffindors and Lee, and had been sickened by what he had seen almost happen.

 _Thank Merlin for wild magic,_ he thought with relief.

He had tried to stun Towler when Lee had attacked Thomas, but the dumb lout had refused to stay down. He'd have to work on that.

 _At least_ _my stunner slowed him down a little,_ he thought with some satisfaction.

Lee had yet to react to his little oncoming light, but Nott knew well enough that his lack of reaction did not mean that he was not _aware_.

"Lee?" He asked softly, trying not to frighten him any worse. They were not friends, but Nott hoped that his use of the other boy's first name would help to put him more at ease.

 _Unlike those monsters that just attacked him,_ he thought with a silent snarl.

"Wh-Who's there?" Lee responded in a trembling voice as he shoved himself more firmly against the wall.

"It's just me—Teddy Nott," he said slowly, calmly.

"T-T-Teddy?"

"Only the professors and my father call me 'Theodore,'" he said with a rueful grin that the other boy was unable to see.

"W-What do you want?"

"I just want to help," he said, crouching down more than an arm's width away from the still sniffling boy.

"W-Why?" Was the whispered response that he got from the hurt Gryffindor.

 _Because Professor Snape is my hero, and I want him to be proud of me_ , he wanted to say but didn't.

"Because Professor Snape has helped me more than anyone else in my entire life, and I know that he cares a lot about you," was his response.

The other boy didn't respond, but he didn't curse him either. Teddy took that to be a good sign.

"Listen, I can understand why you might not trust me to help you right now. But I'm not going to leave you alone here until your dad shows up, understand?"

"Okay," the trembling second year said softly.

"Good."

. . .

Severus had been on the opposite side of the castle with Kingsley, investigating a strange unknown odor, when his necklace had first begun telegraphing signs of his son's distress within his brain.

"Lee is in trouble," he had said tersely to his lover, before quickly turning on his heel in the direction of the disturbance. He had half expected the other man to remain behind and continue on with their previous business without him. Instead, Kingsley had turned and followed him silently, a worried expression passing across his face as he did so.

His lover had not quite been the same after returning from the Dursley's house, becoming rather withdrawn and tightlipped about the whole affair; especially after Severus had tried to find out what atrocities he had witnessed that had caused the man's more somber attitude. Eventually, Severus had agreed to give him time, but he had warned him not to make the wait too long.

Now, all of that was pushed to the back of Severus's mind as he sought to do all he could to protect his son.

They had started out in a fast paced walk, but after only going down one corridor and one set of stairs, Severus had turned that into a jog. It had only been a short time afterwards that he had begun running full out, no longer caring what the castle's occupants thought of him as he raced by. His concern for his son was carefully etched across his brow amongst the furrowed lines that had abruptly appeared there, and within his chest, he could feel the increasing levels of terror that were emanating from his child via the charmed links resting around his neck.

When Lee's wild magic had sprung to life, he had no longer needed just the necklace to inform him of it.

The entire _castle_ had swayed for one ghastly moment, almost as though they were in a boat at _sea_ , before finally becoming still again. Then, unbeknownst to either Lee or Teddy, _all_ of the lights in the castle had gone out at _once_ , casting them all into a thick black darkness.

As if that were not bad enough, a dark storm had come upon the castle sometime in the last hour, and had unleashed a volley of thunderous booms and crackling lightning, before finally letting down an interminable icy barrage of rainwater.

"Damn it!" Severus had cursed as the swaying motion of the castle had tried to throw him down a set of particularly steep and narrow stairs.

Thankfully, Kinglsey had grabbed him by the edge of his black robes, pulling him back up into the other man's strong chest securely until the ground under their feet had finished its fit. From there, he had been able to feel his lover's heartbeat pounding in a steady dance of fear against his own wildly beating one. The combined sounds had grounded him somewhat, and he had made himself take a calming breath as he was held safely through the aftershocks.

From there, they had been forced to make their own lights—using _lumos_ for the majority of the trip, but also lighting torches at random intersections and stairwells in an effort to help along any other unfortunates.

And then finally— _finally_ —they had made it to the correct hallway, on the correct floor, and Severus could see the small light of a wand illuminating two small figures at the other end of it; one of which he _knew_ was his son.

The relief at seeing the small seated form of his boy was almost enough to make his knees buckle, but he forced himself not to think of that, but rather to pay attention to the situation at hand _now_.

. . .

Madam Pomfrey had called in every favor she knew she could use to get herself into the interrogation room of the Flint boy, and thankfully, it had been enough.

The fact that the young boy was responsible for the death of an _auror_ , and that she was in fact very good friends with the young Mr. Kinglsey Shacklebolt _himself_ , had helped her request to be granted, she knew.

Her brother had also managed to pull strings of his own; using his own prestige and power to make pathways where otherwise, there normally would have been none, had also helped into making this moment a reality.

She didn't have much time, but thankfully Flint didn't know that. She had one chance to do whatever she felt was necessary at gathering the truth, and she took it—knowing all too well that the aurors were giving her this largely unsupervised time with the seventh year Slytherin boy only this once, and never again.

As a healer, she had often walked the line between life and death; knowing all too well what one wrong move could do to a life that was being held precariously in that balance.

. . .

Barely thinking about it, Severus lit all of the torches on the hallway with a wandless flick, before quickly traversing the distance left to reach his wayward son. What felt like barely a heartbeat later, he suddenly found himself crouched down in front of Theodore Nott and his own Lee Snape.

His boy's face was bloodied, and his normally bright green eyes were dulled behind his glasses. The tear tracks were clearly evident on his pale cheeks, and Severus could easily see the tremors that were still wreaking their havoc within the child's thin frame.

Severus spared barely a glance at the unconscious forms of the two Gryffindor boys, but quickly gathered the boy into his arms; thanking the deities that the child was still alive, as he did so.

"Will he be okay?" Theodore Nott's voice broke into his meandering thoughts; forcing him to focus his eyes on the boy still standing beside them both.

"We will just have to wait and see, Mr. Nott," he replied in tired voice; readjusting the boy in his arms as he stood.

Severus felt a cold nose being pressed into the arch between his neck and shoulder, and he breathed out a shuddery breath against his boy.

He saw Kingsley examining the two unconscious boys and he felt his anger spike as he realized just who they were.

"Are you checking their signatures?" He asked in a gravelly voice that only hinted at his overwhelming exhaustion and anger.

He got a silent nod in reply.

"Sir?" Nott's voice refocused his mind once more.

"Yes, Mr. Nott?" He asked, being uncharacteristically patient with the young troubled boy before him.

"I have no idea if this means anything to you, but just before Towler passed out, he looked up at Lee with eyes that had a rather _greenish_ tinge to them," the boy said carefully; looking up at Severus with a thoughtful expression on his overly serious face.

Severus's eyes widened fractionally in response and he looked over at Kingsley to see if the other man had heard as well.

This time, the nod he got was barely perceptible to the naked eye, but it was still a confirmation, nonetheless.

_Sweet Merlin, not another one!_

Well, it seemed that Gryffindor and Slytherin _did_ have more in common than just the small boy nestled firmly against Severus's chest.

Speaking of said small boy, Severus knew he needed to do something about the child's state of being, before the lad went into shock. He had no idea whether or not Poppy was back from her "trip," but he knew that between his and Kingsley's knowledge, they would have no trouble healing the child.

The only question left to be answered was what they were to do with the other boys in the meantime?

. . .

Upon reflection, Minerva realized later on that she should have automatically made the connection between that afternoon's disturbance and Severus Snape's son, Lee Snape. It seemed that the connection between the castle and the boy was only growing stronger; a fact that was only reemphasized later on, when she learned of the reasons for the violent occurrence that had taken place beneath their very feet.

After receiving Kingsley's Patronus—a sleek black panther—she had carefully made her way down to the dungeons; moving as quickly as she could, cognizant of the fact that the headmaster was nowhere to be found, despite the problems they were currently faced with.

Honestly, she didn't know whether to be annoyed or relieved.

Her confusion was quickly resolved after being informed of the reasons that her two students were laid out unconscious on the floor of the dungeon hallway.

"Where is he now?" She asked Kingsley.

" _He_ is being treated by Severus back in their quarters," the large man told her in a low voice.

"And Mr. Nott?"

"Is with them."

"Are you certain that he is to be trusted? Perhaps he is involved as well," she said shortly, aware that her prejudices were showing.

Kingsley looked at her quietly for a moment before speaking.

"Might I remind you that the majority of the incidents where the child has been attacked were perpetrated by members of your very own house?" Kingsley's eyes bore into her like no other, causing shame to rise in her chest.

"And your point?" She asked in a colder voice than she had intended.

"Minerva, look at the situation," he answered her in a slightly more clipped tone.

"This year alone, Slytherin has had _six_ missing students. Gryffindor has had _two_ , possibly three—if the fact that Finnigan's remains were never found is taken into account—correct?" He waited for her nod before continuing.

"Of those six, _four_ are still missing, while _one_ is _dead_ , and the other is _mentally unstable_ ," he said with a sneer, giving a frighteningly close approximation to one of Severus Snape's own.

"Gryffindor's," he continued on, "first missing student came back, and although being gravely injured and withdrawn, _is_ managing to show signs of progress, yes?"

She nodded mutely, not trusting herself to speak.

"While Gryffindor's other missing child is currently under suspicion regarding the assumed death of Mr. Seamus Finnigan," he continued in a somber voice, still eyeing her carefully.

"Meanwhile," he said, when she didn't respond, "Slytherin's _head_ _of house_ has adopted Gryffindor's so-called _Golden boy,_ the boy-who-lived. Therefore, why is it that Gryffindor's _head of house_ is still so insistent on blaming the Slytherins for everything; especially during a year that they've actually been the ones _helping_ to keep the defeater of Voldemort _safe_ from his own _housemates?"_

He looked at her in exasperation, his nostrils flaring in obvious anger, as he waited for her to say something.

The look on his face unnerved her, almost as much as his words had, and she took a step backwards away from him in an attempt to calm that quiet fear that he had brought to life within her heart.

"Face the facts, Minerva. Gryffindors _aren't_ good; Slytherins _aren't_ bad; there's a little of both within everyone and each group. Being in Slytherin doesn't automatically make a child into an aloof and cruel sadist, and being in Gryffindor doesn't automatically make a child into the bloody _hero_."

He turned back towards the two unconscious boys and quickly bound them with ropes that sprung from his wand, before casting _mobilicorpus_ on them both and floating them down the hallway.

She continued standing there in the same position, her mind still reeling with the implications of his words, when he stopped at the other end of the hallway and looked at her questioningly.

"Coming?" He asked in a far more solicitous voice.

She corrected her posture and wiped the hair out of her face— _and nothing else,_ she swore to herself—before turning smartly on her heel and quickly making her way over to where he was waiting.

. . .

After giving Theodore Nott a stiff warning not to go poking his nose in anything, lest he regret bringing him here, Severus carried his boy back into his bedroom, before carefully setting them both down on his larger bed.

In the light of the room, his son's features only looked worse. The boy's cheek and windpipe were bruised; the latter being the more serious of the two. Severus gently lifted his child's head and nearly hissed aloud in displeasure at seeing the purpling imprint of the finger shaped lines that were shown in abundance there.

Carefully, he removed the lad's robes, and then followed it with his tie and shirt, working the fingers of his right hand over the buttons and knots with a trembling ease of motion; all while he held the boy close to his chest with the other arm. It no longer bothered him that he had become proficient at one-handed tasks.

He allowed the child to hide his face in his robes for as long as he could; knowing all too well that his boy felt safest there.

He checked over the lad's torso and once again had to fight against the urge to hiss or curse at the damage he found there as well. There was a dark purple welt present around his son's navel, complete with clear knuckle delineations at the bruise's base. In addition to that damnable evidence, his boy let out a low whimper every time Severus accidently put any pressure on his left side; letting him know that the boy's ribs were injured. He hoped very sincerely for his son, and also for his attackers, that they were not broken.

Sometime during his examination, Kingsley had appeared at his side, taking his sons's legs into his lap as he did so. He was thankful for his lover's presence, not only for the comforting warmth he provided both Snapes, but also because his diagnostic skills were much more detailed than Severus's own.

Together they worked in one concentrated effort to heal his son; Severus working on clearing away the dried blood from his child's hair, as Kingsley healed the concussion found there; Severus applying bruise salve to the boy's cheek and neck, then waiting as Kingsley checked for any remaining damage to the lad's windpipe and vocal cords; Severus giving his son pain relieving potions as Kingsley adjusted the boy's ribs and collarbone—something Severus hadn't even found!

And so it went until both Severus and Lee were exhausted, and he wondered how Kingsley was still managing to be as focused as much as he was.

Normally it would have annoyed him to be picked up by his lover, his son still curled securely against him, but his exhaustion was apparently stronger than his indignity and he barely made a sound as they were gently moved onto the bed proper.

Kingsley removed their shoes, and then went so far as to unbutton Severus's collar, before pulling the blankets up around them both and tucking them in carefully.

"Remind me to get you for this later," Severus murmured tiredly as Kingsley spelled off the lights.

Kingsley's chuckle was his only response.

. . .

As a child, Poppy hadn't known that everyone couldn't read minds the same as her and her grandmother; she had simply taken it as normal reality until her parents had thought to inform her otherwise.

She knew now that there was a name for the games she and her grandmother used to play: _Legilimency;_ at least, that was what the scholars called it.

Her parents had told her part of it then, but had waited until she was older to inform her of the rest. She had been warned against speaking of it to anyone, and never to use what she had learned to hurt others. It was a lesson driven home by her father, and it was one that she had never forgotten.

Working as a healer, she had only ever used her skill to help find the hidden injuries, in order to help her patients begin to heal.

However, her work as a member of the Order of the Phoenix had pushed her to the limits with what she could do and what she _could_ do towards helping the people around her. For the first time in many decades, she had been forced to break her promise to her father; something that was only made harder by his untimely death, thanks to the death eaters.

Could it be right to hurt one person in exchange for the safety of many more? Perhaps more importantly, the question was whether or not she could _live_ with herself if she did agree to such a thing.

In the end, the decision was made for her when Severus was arrested as a Death Eater, nearly losing his soul in the process. She was granted permission to see him, there in that dank cold cell in Azkaban. Her mind awash with the horrors of finding her father's mutilated body under the telling sign of the floating dark mark, she had tried to talk to him, only to be rebutted by his cold stare, his hard demeanor.

Not willing to lose yet another loved one to the nightmarish "Dark Lord," she had stepped forwards and grabbed his chin, pointing his face upwards towards her own.

She had shocked him, she knew; it was written all over his face and thoughts. But she had continued her search of his mind and his memories, and when it had been over, she had dropped to his side and pulled him into a tight hug. There, she had refused to let go until he had broken down and cried into the softness of her chest; all the while, stroking his dirty matted hair and whispering soft words into his ear until he had calmed down—just like she had done with the thirteen year-old boy he once had been.

Ultimately, Albus had come through for them all, even though it had been an unsure thing right up until the end. His slow response had angered her then and it still angered her now.

It was with that furious feeling boiling inside her that fueled her movements as she sliced through Flint's mind; his chin held her hand with a sharp nailed vengeance; his eyes wide as she raped his mind for the information they so desperately needed.

And when it was over, she left him in the hands of the hard-faced aurors, knowing how likely they were to cast an obliviate or two the moment she was gone.

She went straight to the nearest lady's washroom, and as soon as she was certain she was alone, her quiet calm and poise crumbled, and she found herself vomiting forcefully into the toilet.

It was strange that as a healer, she could bear witness to the sight of many disturbing sights and never get sick, yet it took no more than a simple touch to make her violently ill.

And then, of course, there was the information that she had gleaned from the mind of that "boy." She wanted to pensieve it—and of course she would, when she was back at Hogwarts—but until then, she felt it a fitting punishment for the actions she had just partaken in; deserved or not.


	61. Unraveling a Small Nott

Kingsley had a small inkling that his lover's exhaustion was likely caused more by his magical link _to_ the boy himself, rather than his work _with_ the boy.

 _Nothing to be done for it,_ he thought with a smirk as he left the sleeping pair in the darkened bedroom and walked out to where the Nott boy was waiting.

. . .

Lee lay in the darkness curled tightly against his father.

Sometimes it still amazed him that Professor Snape was his _father_ —the man who cared so much for _him_. It gave him a warm feeling that made his entire body tingle, all the way down to the tips of his toes.

He tried to shift into a slightly more comfortable position, but a sudden flare of pain across his side made him freeze where he was. With a deep breath, he lay back down in his former position and tried to determine exactly how injured he was. While his body still ached, it was not at all like it had been directly following the attack.

 _The attack—_ he had been _attacked_ by members of his own house! His eyes widened briefly in the dark as the details of the fight abruptly flooded his mind again.

And yet, even though the memory made him shudder ever so slightly, it didn't make him want to cry; nor was he filled with shame over what had happened. It did make him a little sick to his stomach though, thinking of what they had almost achieved with him.

 _But they didn't win_ , he thought with growing excitement.

 _And I_ hurt _them_ , was his next amazed realization.

"I hurt them," he whispered very softly to himself.

 _Me! Lee Snape! I hurt_ them! _Not the other way around!_

There was something else there too that he couldn't quite grasp onto. He pondered to himself a moment longer before it hit him.

_I'm not afraid!_

"I'm not afraid!" He suddenly exclaimed aloud; so completely floored by the revelation that he completely forgot to keep his voice down.

Abruptly, a soft light filled the room and he found himself looking at the rumpled visage of his father.

"Are you quite all right?" His father asked him worriedly.

Lee couldn't help but laugh.

. . .

When the dark skinned auror came back without Professor Snape, Teddy was immediately put on the defensive. He had heard stories about how aurors had wronged his family across numerous generations, and he had even seen his father get roughed up by "Mad Eye" Moody once—for no good reason, even!

All of the Slytherins knew that Professor Snape had been working with this particular auror investigating the disappearance of all of those missing boys, but that didn't actually mean that the man was on _their_ side.

 _Hell_ , _look at Dumbledore! Professor Snape has to work with him, and he's_ definitely _not on our side._

Professor Snape had warned them all not to travel alone, and never _ever_ to go to Dumbledore's office alone, especially without telling anyone about it first. The man had warned them to watch out for suspicious behavior from others; not just from adults, but other kids too, and had even bothered to take the time out of his schedule to teach them exactly what he meant by that.

It gave Teddy a warm feeling inside to know that someone cared about what happened to him outside of grades and behavior and those stupid house points.

Their professor was a right ol' gentleman of a wizard, and someday, Teddy thought he might actually manage to get up the nerve to tell him that himself.

Someday.

. . .

Kingsley looked at the kid sitting before him on the couch within Severus's sitting room. It was obvious that the boy was frightened of him, but was still trying to look nonchalant.

Nott's reaction amused him, but it also made him a bit sad to think of all of the reasons that the kid was already so wary of him.

Kingsley took a seat in the armchair adjacent to the couch, and tried to keep himself relaxed. It did not escape his attention that the boy beside him had immediately stiffened when he sat down.

"My name is Kingsley Shacklebolt," he said, reaching out a hand to the 2nd year Slytherin.

"Hullo," Nott said in a quiet voice, tentatively shaking his hand. "Theodore Nott."

 _Nott_ — _of course he's afraid of me!_ Kingsley's mind immediately turned to the boy's father; the so-called reformed Death Eater. The man was a menace; not just a danger to Muggles, but also to anyone smaller or weaker than him.

 _Poor kid_ , Kingsley thought to himself, making an effort to keep his face neutral.

. . .

"D'you think mum can see us?" Lee asked from where he was sitting beside Severus, their backs against the headboard of his bed. They were still on Severus's bed, and had been ever since Lee had accidentally woken his father.

"Why do you ask?" Severus asked curiously.

"I dunno," he replied with a shrug.

"I guess I like to think that she can; that's all," he muttered quietly after a moment of being stared at by his father.

"I am sure," his father began, looking thoughtful, "that if given the choice of what she could watch, she would likely pick you as her subject matter."

Lee grinned at his response, and then had another thought.

"D'you think she's happy to see you too?"

He watched carefully as his father looked away from him while he thought about the question. Lee knew that this was his father's way—at least when he was around him—to process his emotions without scaring him.

"I have no idea," Severus replied after turning his now calm face back to Lee.

The man's voice sounded curiously thick to Lee's perceptive ears, and he wondered quietly if Severus would ever admit that he had loved her.

"I think she is," he said with a careful look at his father. "She would have wanted you to be happy, I think."

"Perhaps," his father said quietly.

_He loves Kingsley too, just like he loved mum._

"I'd bet she still loves you, dad," Lee added a bit nervously.

 _That_ certainly got his father's attention.

"As I recall, _you_ weren't actually there, were you?" His father replied snidely.

 _Ouch, that hurt_ , Lee thought with an internal twinge.

"Well no, but it's pretty obvious from the way you talk about her that you loved her. I figured it must have been mutual," he said, unconsciously pulling away a bit from his father's side.

 _Like with Kingsley,_ he added silently.

"I do not wish to speak any further on this subject," his father said coldly.

Lee felt a pang in his heart, but before he could stop himself, more words tumbled haphazardly out of his mouth.

"I think you're being too hard on yourself. If you can still love her, then she can still love you—regardless of death."

Severus turned towards him, his eyes glinting almost frighteningly as he glared down at him.

"What gives you the idea that you know more than me about long lasting love?" Severus's eyes widened as he finished his sentence; painfully aware of what he had just said to his child.

"Son, I didn't mean—," Severus hastily tried to take his words back; only to be cut off by a suddenly irate looking Lee.

His fear forgotten, Lee glared at his father; furious beyond words at what the man had just said to him.

 _Why don't you just say what you mean, dad?_ He railed to himself internally. _Little orphan boys don't know anything about love, right dad?_

"Just because the Dursleys _hated_ me, doesn't mean that I don't know anything about love," he answered through gritted teeth.

His father reached a hand for him, but he scooted backwards, not wanting to be touched right then.

A pain flared in his side once more, but he clamped his arm down there, only letting out a hiss of discomfort.

If anything, his action only increased the look of misery on his father's face. He tried to ignore it in favor of what he was trying to make his dad understand.

Severus opened his mouth as though to say something, but Lee shot him a look of pure Snape-like wrath, and the man shut his mouth again. At any other moment, Lee would have been proud and a bit scared to have achieved such a thing, but his current anger had pushed him beyond such feelings.

"No, you listen to me this time, _dad_ ," he said angrily. The pain from his side was only helping to reinforce the effect of his words.

"You've spent so much of your life regretting the actions you've taken, but more importantly dad, I think you're most angry about what actions you _didn't_ take. The things you _didn't_ do weigh more heavily on you, and so they have more _power_ over you," he said; beginning to feel a bit lightheaded from the effort of remaining upright.

Or maybe it was just because his father was actually listening to _him_ for once—he wasn't sure which.

"I'm not going to let you make another mistake like that," he said, gulping as his words finally started registering within his brain.

 _I'm not letting you lose Kingsley like you did with mum_ , he thought fearfully; finally understanding why his words felt so important to him.

"You asked me why I thought I knew anything about love," he said, unwilling to let the original argument be forgotten.

The intensity of Severus's gaze was beginning to unnerve him slightly.

"I know about love, because you love _me!_ " He said quietly, the pain in his heart now vying for attention against the pain in his side.

"You look at Kingsley like you look at _me_ , but different, dad. You love him so much that you're afraid to do anything about him, because you don't want to lose him," he added softly, hastily pushing his glasses up to rub his eyes dry.

Lee scooted closer to his dad, biting his lip at the pain it caused him. Severus seemed almost _afraid_ to touch him now; so he reached out his own hand—not the one that he was still holding against his side—and took the larger man's hand in his. It did not surprise him that his dad's hands were icy cold.

"But dad, you're going to lose him if you don't ever do anything about letting him know how you _feel_ ," he said in a whisper, causing Severus to look pained.

He waited for his dad to speak, but Severus only continued to stare at him sadly, before abruptly looking away. Finally his father sighed; before looking back up at him with a tired—almost _defeated_ —look on his face.

Lee didn't like seeing him like this and he suddenly wasn't at all sure that he should have said anything at all.

He watched as his father reached out his hand and touched Lee's face ever so lightly with his fingertips.

"Child, you are right to say that I love you, because it is certainly true," his father said, speaking very softly, moving his hand to Lee's shoulder.

"And you are right that I did love your mother very much," his father admitted in a thick voice. "But whether she would say the same thing about me now is anyone's guess."

Lee's hand clenched spasmodically around the hand still resting in his dad's lap as he heard the man's words; it wasn't _right_ for Voldemort to have taken so much from the people around him.

"I must admit that I am somewhat surprised that you are not worried about Kingsley becoming more important to me than you. Most children in your stead are typically concerned about losing their parent's affections when they are suddenly forced to share with another."

"I'm not like most other kids, dad," Lee said in a small voice. "I just want you to be happy," he said, his voice cracking a bit.

Severus leaned in towards him, putting his mouth next to Lee's ear.

"Having you as a son has already made me very happy," his dad whispered roughly next to his head.

Lee felt his insides twist in response to Severus's words, but despite his embarrassment, he was pleased by his father's admission.

"Then what do you have to lose?" He whispered back just as softly.

His father sat back and looked at him speculatively for another moment before speaking.

"Perhaps you are right," he responded with a thoughtful look.

"How much pain are you in right now?" Severus asked in a louder voice; suddenly changing the course of the conversation with a critical look towards Lee's side.

"It's not too bad," he answered ambiguously, not quite daring to meet his dad's eyes.

"As you yourself told me, you are _not_ like most other 'kids,'" Severus told him, a look of distaste moving across his features as he used the dreaded slang word.

"So I ask again. How much pain are you in? And do not make me ask again," Severus warned with an even sharper look at him; making him squirm in discomfort as he realized that Professor—" _I don't take bullshit for answers_ "—Snape was now sitting before him once more.

"A bit?" Lee asked with a one shouldered shrug.

"Come now Lee; if you are going to require me to tell Kingsley how _I_ feel, then the least you can do is to tell me how _you_ feel," Severus asked him with a smirk.

Lee's jaw dropped as he realized the very Slytherin manner in which he had just been maneuvered.

"You just Slytherinized me!" He said in an accusing voice.

"I don't actually think that is a word," his father asked with a raised eyebrow.

"Whatever the word is, you just did it!" He pointed out in an affronted voice.

"Do you truly object to me caring about you in such a manner?" His father asked him with a serious look.

It was Lee's turn to open and then close his mouth without speaking.

_Damn it; the man actually has a point!_

"So you'll tell him how you feel if I answer your question first?" He asked slowly, wanting to make sure there weren't any loopholes to what his dad was proposing.

"Yes," his father replied, still smirking at him.

Lee looked away with a grimace, thinking it over.

"I want to be present when you tell him," he added finally, looking back at his father with a determined look.

Lee watched the smirk vanish from Severus's face, before being replaced by his more traditional scowl.

"Fine," the man agreed reluctantly a moment later, eyeing Lee with a new level of respect as he did so.

. . .

Kingsley had gotten the few details that Nott knew about the fight he witnessed between Lee and his housemates. Although their conversation had been amicable enough, the boy still was wary of him; flinching every time Kingsley made any kind of move, unwilling to actually look at him directly.

He quietly pondered the differences between the Nott boy and the child that Severus had adopted. It was odd to realize that despite the Dursleys being Muggle, and the Notts pureblooded, both had still managed to produce fairly similar children.

Truly, it seemed that cruelty cared little for the boundaries between wizards and muggles.

These were the thoughts that permeated his brain as he carefully walked the young boy back to the Slytherin dormitory that night.

. . .

Severus and a wan looking Lee were sitting on the couch when Kingsley returned from his trip to the Slytherin dormitories.

"Awake now, are we?" He asked with a low chuckle.

His question was answered by a surly scowl from his lover and a weak laugh from the boy.

Narrowing his eyes in thought, the large man strolled over to where they were sitting and crouched down directly in front of the child. He watched the boy exhibit a small flinch at his sudden close proximity, before quickly controlling himself.

"You are still in pain," he stated to the child, flicking his eyes at his lover in concern.

Interestingly enough, the boy looked up at his father before answering; compelling Kingsley to glance back up at his lover questioningly.

He watched Severus scowl down at his son, then turn exasperated eyes onto Kingsley.

"He refuses to be healed until—," Severus cut off with a frustrated growl and looked away from them both.

Intrigued, Kingsley looked at the dark haired man and watched as the edges of his face slowly turned pink.

_What on earth did Lee say to him?_

"Until what, Severus?" He asked gently, gathering the man's unusually cold hands in his own warm ones.

"Until I speak with you," Severus managed to get out between clenched teeth. He turned his piercing eyes on Kingsley, causing his breath to catch in his throat at the intensity he saw looking out at him.

"About?" He breathed.

"My . . . _feelings,"_ his lover spat out the word like a curse.

Kingsley's stomach was beginning to flutter at the possible implications that word held.

"Regarding?" He prompted in a hesitant voice.

" _You_ ," Severus ground out in a rough growl.

"Me?" He blinked, looking at Lee in surprise.

 _Did the boy know?_ _How?_

Lee was looking back at them both with a small proud smile, even as he fought to remain upright against the pain his injuries were still causing him.

Kingsley looked wonderingly back at Severus, only to be caught off guard once more by the strength of emotion that was staring back at him from his lover's typically reserved countenance.

Shifting his cramping legs into a kneeling position, Kingsley suddenly felt an overwhelming desire to know _just_ how Severus felt about him.

"Severus? Should I ask Lee instead?" He teased.

Severus's nostrils flared in indignation at his question.

Then, seemingly out of nowhere, Kingsley abruptly got an answer to his unspoken wish.

"I love you," Severus bit out hoarsely, his face burning red for an instant before fading back into a more familiar shade.

. . .

A mortified Severus watched as his lover's eyebrows both raise suddenly after hearing his inane admission.

Still not speaking, his lover stood up with a slight wince, before quickly taking a seat to the right of Severus. Kingsley draped an arm around his stiff shoulders, and Severus held his breath as he waited for the laughter that was sure to follow his words. He was already planning his escape when Kingsley began speaking.

"Well that certainly makes things easier," Kingsley said casually enough from beside him. Severus let out his breath in trepidation for the heartbreaking words he felt positive were still coming.

"Look at me," his lover said in a low voice, his breath ghosting over Severus's ear gently.

Forgetting his anger at his son—nearly forgetting the boy's presence completely—Severus reluctantly turned his head towards his lover.

Using the arm that was draped over his shoulder, Kingsley pulled him closer to his chest.

Tensely, Severus allowed himself to be pulled.

"For Merlin's sake, Severus," Kingsley said in clear exasperation.

"Can't you see that I love you too, you fool?"

Severus's eyes widened in shock, and he barely registered the sensation of Kingsley's lips against his mouth until he felt the other man's tongue against his own.

And then his paralysis and fear broke into a fiery kiss that passionately burned away his remaining feelings of inadequacy.

Distantly he heard a whoop come from behind him, but he ignored it in light of his need to consume the man sitting under him.

 _Under?_ Oh yes, Severus was nearly on top of Kingsley, deepening the kiss with a fervor that neither man had known him to possess until that very moment.

It was only his dratted need to breathe that paused their moment, and it was in that bit of harshly gasping silence that he noticed another sound from behind him.

Turning himself around, he noticed with some alarm that his formerly exuberant child was now coughing violently, his face very nearly white with pain.

As one, both men rose to their feet, quickly coming to the aid of the small hurt child beside them.

. . .

It was only later, after Lee had been healed, dosed with potions and then put to bed, that Kingsley finally talked to Severus about the horrors that the Dursley house had revealed to him.

Once more, they were seated on Severus's bed—half in the covers and half out—both now wearing pajamas, wrapped around one another protectively and covetously.

Most of what Kingsley told him about, Severus had already known, but hearing it tumble shakily forth from the lips of an otherwise hardened auror somehow made it much harder to bear.

"One other thing Severus," Kingsley wearily said at the end of his account.

Severus looked at him with overwhelmed eyes— _there was more?_

"Despite what Lee thinks about the favoured treatment that his cousin seemed to receive most of the time, he still was never privy to some of the things the other boy was forced to endure from behind closed doors."

"You mean to say that the Dursleys could _get_ any more depraved?" He whispered in horror tinged resignation.

The Dark Lord seemed almost _benign_ after hearing about the terrible abuse his son had received at the hands of those, those _monsters_.

"Severus," Kingsley turned red rimmed eyes directly onto his face.

"Vernon Dursley _raped_ his own son. What's more, he's been raping the boy since he was _nine_."

 _Raped his own son—_ the words were hideously familiar, and they brought his mind back around to the young Theodore Nott.

Unbeknownst to anyone else, Theodore Nott had been given special permission to sleep through any and all of Severus's Potions classes. Although not naturally gifted in the art of making potions, the boy was _teachable_ and therefore adequate in his own way outside of the classroom, under Severus's critical eye.

Nott suffered from nightmares similar in intensity to his own son's, if not in display. The boy had somehow taught himself to wandlessly cast silencing spells during his nightmares; no doubt a lesson learned through the heavy handed punishment that he frequently received from the brutish and bullying hand of his father.

Severus would likely never have learned of the nightmares if it hadn't been for the blood. It had set off his personal wards, which alerted him whenever such a thing occurred. Blood loss was periodically a severe problem within the snake den, but it was usually a result of fights _between_ students, as opposed to being self-inflicted.

Although, as Severus was well aware, self-inflicted wounds among his students still occurred; often more commonly than he would have preferred.

Nott's wounds then, were of yet _another_ special category; given that the boy hurt himself while _asleep_ , and therefore was rarely aware of why he had done such a thing upon waking the next morning.

Twice a week, Severus gave Nott dreamless sleep, but he was unwilling to give the boy more than that, lest he become hopelessly addicted. Thankfully, after seeing what his head of house was willing to do for him, the lad had trusted Severus enough to speak with him about the few nightmares that he _could_ remember; as well as a number of other disturbing things that the boy had witnessed growing up.

For instance, Severus well remembered the day that Theodore had told him about his older brother, Brian. Severus had been surprised to learn of the existence of an older brother, but as the boy explained, things had quickly become clear.

Brian Nott was born a squib within a Voldemort aligned pureblooded family. He was little more than a muggle, and had a status even lower than that of a house elf. The boy was only a few years older than Theodore, but his place within the family was already established.

The elder Nott used Brian as a fuck toy; extracting his revenge against the boy's squib status every time he raped him. This hadn't started until Brian and Theodore were nine and six years-old, respectively. It had been then that Theodore's father had decided that Brian had to be a squib, having never displayed any displays of accidental magic in all that time.

Theodore had been forced to watch as his father denounced his brother—and hero—before the entire family, before beating him senselessly and then finally taking him violently on the floor. Brian had been relegated to a small room in the attic, where he was chained naked to the wall. He was given only a thin blanket and three bowls: one for food, one for water and one to relieve himself in.

The story had more than revolted Severus, but even more disturbing than the story itself, had been the deadpan way in which the younger Nott boy had relayed the information to him.

It was obvious from the self-inflicted wounds that Nott gave himself while unconscious that his emotions had not been removed from his person, but instead merely buried deep inside his mind; unable to express themselves except when he was asleep.

Severus shivered with the knowledge of the _despicable_ things that he knew about the Nott family via the young Slytherin boy, and distantly he felt Kay's arms tighten around him. These were memories that he tried not to dwell on; not just because they were horrible and wretched in quality, but because he was forced to be a silent witness to them.

"What are you thinking about?" Kingsley whispered into his ear, bringing him back to the present with a harsh jerk.

He was suddenly aware that his entire body was trembling, while his stomach churned nauseatingly within him.

"If I tell you, you will be _compelled_ to do something, and my student will be in even more danger than he is in currently," Severus said bitterly.

"Is it worse than the Dursleys?"

"Comparable," Severus said wearily, his many responsibilities weighing heavily on his mind and heart.

"What is it that you always say to Lee about sharing his demons, lest they begin controlling him?" The concern was evident within his voice and Severus found himself yearning desperately to share the knowledge of the demons of his student's past.

"Kay, I—," he started, before shaking his head in frustration at the impossible situation.

Lives weren't _meant_ to be lived like _this_. He no longer was sure whether the Dark Lord had really started the hatred present in Nott's father, or whether the man had merely given them a means to exercise the darkness already present in their souls.

"Severus," the dark haired man was shaken by the urgency present in his lover's voice.

"Let me _help_ ," Kingsley pleaded with him.

Dark brown eyes stared down at him and he felt himself nodding, despite his fears for the boy in question.

Warm lips pressed against his, and he quietly took the comfort that the kiss bestowed to him, before breaking it with a sad smile.

"You can't save the entire world, Kay," he said.

"No _we_ can't," the other man said with a hard glint in his eyes.

"But we _can_ become bloody annoying nuisances to them in the meantime," Kingsley added, not needing to explain to Severus just whom he meant by _them_.


	62. A View From The Other Side

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a strangely circular chapter.
> 
> Of course, I can't ever just give you anything cut and dried, right? As Kingsley taught Lee a few chapters back, there is no such thing as good and evil—only shades of gray.

He felt impossibly dirty; unclean in a way that water—or even magic—could never touch, although Merlin knew he had tried.

If Malfoys were inclined towards pity, he knew he would likely be wallowing in it.

Sweet heavens above—what he had been forced to his _own son_ —the images were permanently burnt into his memories.

It wasn't like it had been with that Potter brat; no, he had _enjoyed_ that, had taken pleasure with the act itself and if given the chance, would do it again!

He sneered in remembrance of how that sweet virgin boy's arse had felt around him; even as the boy had bucked against him, helplessly— _desperately—_ crying out his weak pleas for mercy as Lucius had taken him cruelly there on the stone floor; the boy's little friends shocked into silence around them at the horrors of what he was doing to the wizarding world's little _hero_.

 _The little whore!_ Lucius thought with a vengeance.

Potter had been so _hot_ , so _good_ , and so _tight_ around his cock. Who could blame him for indulging a little?

But the images of what he had been forced to do to his son—his _heir_ —those always managed to push their nasty way back into his consciousness; making the bliss from his rape of the Potter boy fade away nearly to nothing as he fought against the impending rise of nausea that the other memories always brought with them.

The look in his son's eyes as he had beaten him, whipping him until he had bled and then some; that had stayed with him in his waking hours, and howled at him in his nightmares.

At some level, he supposed that it was a fitting punishment for him. Rather ironic really that he had gotten out of Azkaban the first time by claiming that he had been under _Imperius_ ; only to have it cast on him years later, in order that he might ruthlessly partake in the rape and brutalization of his own son, his own _child._

 _My own flesh and blood_ , he thought bitterly, looking down at his long aristocratic fingers in disgust.

Although clean now, he could still remember what his hands had looked like covered with the blood of his _Dragon_.

 _And the smell_ —he shuddered slightly at _those_ memories.

In his youth, he had gleefully taken part in the revelries of the Dark Lord; his flair and interest in the intricacies of torturing the muggles quickly setting him apart from the other death eaters, allowing him access to the Dark Lord's inner circle.

 _Not like that fool Severus_ , he thought with a disdainful sneer. _With his potions and his spying, the man was weaker than a half-starved pup._

 _Like his son_ —the thought came unbidden into his mind; causing him to jerk forwards in realization.

The memory that Severus—of all people, of all _slime—_ had dared— _dared_ —to get in-between him and his _whore_ still rankled.

The Dark Lord had had his own uses for the greasy haired bastard; something Lucius had not bothered dwelling on, quite certain that he'd rather not be burdened with _that_ kind of knowledge; even _he_ had to have _some_ limits.

Although, it rather seemed that he had more morals than he had previously been aware of; a thought that perturbed him, because it meant that he didn't know himself as well as he thought he had.

He had no problem with idea of _fucking_ his son. They had been working up to it for some time, and he was certain that when the time had come—say in a year or two—they both would have been pleased with the arrangement.

His problem with the situation came because he had been forced, against his will, to _rape_ his _son;_ to do nearly the same thing to his _heir_ as he done to the Potter boy; almost as though they were on the same level of worthless filth.

His master might just as well have said that his _flesh_ was _filth_ , just like any mudblood or halfblood bitch.

He knew that his master had been angry with him for a number of reasons, but to just rub it in his face that _He_ thought the flesh— _the_ _blood_ —of a Malfoy was completely _worthless,_ made him burn in anger.

"Such a slippery snake you are, my Lucius," a voice from behind him interrupted his musings, causing him to stiffen in his seat.

Warm dry fingers touched his face, moving his hair and fingering it—making him think of the other things those same fingers had touched in such a way. He was forced to swallow hard against the bile that threatened to rise in his throat at the thought.

"What is my Lucius thinking about today, I wonder," a hint of malevolence in the other's voice sent small licks of fire through his nerve endings.

"Life," he said with a slight sneer, never one to fail at playing his part.

"Ah life; ever a treacherous subject to dwell on; so difficult it is to get _into_ this life, yet how easy it is to _leave_ it," as the other's hand left his person, he swallowed again, but this time in relief.

"So many ways to depart this world," his master continued on; stepping around to stand in front of him, hands crossed casually behind his back.

"And so few ways to gain _reentry_ ," his master looked straight at him as though he thought Lucius might have something to say about his statement.

But Lucius kept his mouth shut, even as other's eyes raked down his body in obvious lust. He felt his balls tighten up in fear, drawing closer to his body in preparation for whatever would happen next.

"I must make a new batch of the potion, Lucius," the man who was his master said with a sneer down towards him.

Lucius knew that this was coming, ever since Draco had "escaped" their clutches. He knew it when he left the boy's manacles open, after "helping" his master to use him again that night. He knew what would happen if Draco were no longer there to provide that last _particular_ ingredient; just as he knew who would take his son's place in his stead.

His master's hand was back on his chest, and he felt helpless with the knowledge of what he had to do in order to save his son.

Abruptly, his master's hand clenched down on his chest, pinching his nipple with enough force to make him grunt with the sensation. His master pinched harder, practically pulling him to his feet with just that one point of contact, and he felt tears gather in his eyes from the pain.

"I could _imperius_ you, you know," his master whispered silkily into his ear, shortly before pushing his tongue in with a wet thrust against his earlobe. He pressed his fingernails into his palms and promised himself that he would not add yet another volley of screams to his already overly populated nightmares.

"It would work the same," his master's hand roamed over his chest, before touching the top edge of his pants with a flick.

The other man pushed him backwards, forcing him to hastily sidestep the chair, lest he fall.

 _Malfoys don't fall; Malfoys don't cry; Malfoys don't hurt_ , he chanted to himself mentally; remembering the lessons of his own lecherous father all too well.

A harsh push in the center of his chest roughly threw him backwards against the edge of a table—roughly hewn oak by the feel of it—causing the backs of his legs to cry out in protest as they struck.

His pants were undone now and he felt his master's hand slip easily through the space between the cloth and his own flesh.

"I could make you hard for me," his master whispered breathily, pushing him enough that Lucius was left swaying precariously backwards, just waiting for the moment that his spine would strike the hard wooden surface.

"One little word," his master said, growling low in his throat as his fingers closed fully around Lucius's hot flesh, pulling it up into the light to gaze at it cruelly.

"You could be bleeding to death, and still you would _moan_ for me," his master said, throwing him easily onto the surface of the table with an idle flick of his hand.

His cock was only standing at half-staff when his master had grasped him, but the other man's hand was very talented, and soon—despite his best efforts—he was painfully hard, his breath burning harshly in his chest.

"I wonder if this is how Mr. Potter felt when you loomed over him, ready to push yourself into his soul?"

His anger flashed as he realized how true the other's words were regarding his predicament now.

This was the same man who thought his family—his _legacy—_ was worth the same as _filth_.

"Was this how Severus felt?" That same breathy voice was back in his ear, even as magic swirled around him, divesting him of his garments.

Unthinking, he tried to sit up, tried to pull himself out of his master's far too warm hands.

Not since the days of his father had he been forced to be so submissive.

"No!" He gritted out, pushing against the hands with far too much ease.

He felt the other's eyes flash malevolently at him as he managed to get off of the damned table.

The man didn't need to get the last ingredient from _him_. There were plenty of other substitutes who could easily take his place.

His master was doing this because he wanted _Lucius_ to _suffer_.

A foot kicked out into his knee, followed shortly by a fist that connected sharply with his nose, splattering blood across the wall.

He felt a scream rise in his chest, but he bit down against it as he fell forwards onto the cold stone floor.

"Why did you let my toy go without my permission?" His master's voice was curiously calm, utterly devoid of emotion even as his own senses howled to be acknowledged.

The other man was sitting atop his back, clawed fingers curled painfully against his throat. His nose continued to bleed freely as he felt the man shift his position on him, substantially limiting his ability to breathe.

A spell crackled in the air and then the fingers were gone from his throat; a thick dark collar left in their place. Lucius didn't know how his master was doing it, but the material of the collar kept constricting and releasing on its own; even after he felt his master's hands roaming elsewhere on his body.

It was almost as though someone were raping his mouth, pushing deeper and deeper into his throat with every thrust, gagging him—suffocating him; then pulling out only to repeat the process over again.

Dimly he felt his body being turned, and he hissed as his bare back came in contact with the frigid floor.

He tried to sit up, and the collar constricted down to nothing. He dropped his head back with a clunk, gasping against the pain.

"I believe that I asked you a question," his master said, backhanding him across the face harshly.

He felt a dry warm digit at his entrance, and he pulled away from its intrusion; very aware of the consequences, yet still willing to take the chance.

The other man's hand grasped his cock, trying to pull it back up to attention. He smiled coldly down at Lucius from where he was poised, ready to rip him in two.

"If you don't want to play, then we don't have to," his master said with a cold look in his eyes; a striking contrast to the heat of his hands and body.

Those all too warm hands grabbed onto his buttocks and pulled him open, completely unprepared and unlubed. The man's smile haunted his mind as he closed his eyes against the burning intrusion of his master's cock into his arse.

The first inch was misery, but he managed to keep his mouth shut as he tried to remain relaxed.

" _Imperio_ ," the spell washed over him almost benevolently, until the mental instruction was given.

" _I command you to fight me with everything you have in you, and after I am through, I command you to orgasm,"_ the haunting voice said to his compliant mind, faint laughter trailing off into nothingness as he began to do its bidding.

And then he did scream, and buck, and fight against the hard presence of his master within his guts. It burned, and it ripped him from the inside out, but he paid the pain little attention, so intent on obeying the magical instructions that had told him to fight, that he could think of little else.

It was only after, when he had finished shooting himself into the waiting glass vial that his master had out specifically for him, that he was able to think of anything beyond his fury.

"Be thankful that I have decided not to have you clean me off with your mouth, as you did with Mr. Weasley," the smile was back, even if the other man did seem somewhat winded now.

Afterwards, while lying in a pool of his own blood and shit, his master's cum running down his thighs, his face wet with tears—and all in combination with the feel of the incessant pain that kept rippling through him—he was forced to admit that perhaps pity did have its place within a Malfoy's life.

If only just this once.


	63. Hufflepuff

The first thing that Poppy did after getting back to Hogwarts—following a quick side trip to her quarters to carefully pensieve the forcibly taken memories—was to find Minerva, Pomona and Kingsley, and then visit a certain dormitory.

She was aware that it was only three in the morning and that the students' sleep was likely to be interrupted by their actions there, but her concern for their safety outweighed all of that.

Flint hadn't even been aware that he had known the identity of young man they were searching out that night, but Poppy had seen the connection almost immediately. Unfortunately, her worry that any private communications with Hogwarts would be found out meant that she couldn't forewarn any of the others until she was physically back.

After meeting in her office and getting the pertinent details, the four adults promptly flooed to the Hufflepuff dormitory. A shaken Pomona stepped through the green fire first, and was quickly followed by the others, with Minerva bringing up the rear.

Poppy looked around the Badger common room in mild distaste. Although it had been some years since her last visit, the setting had not changed in the least—so far as she could tell. In contrast with the stark design of the Slytherin common room, the Hufflepuff common area was filled with mismatched pieces of furniture; fairly comfortable looking, she supposed, but nothing like how a _true_ common room was supposed to appear.

 _Even the Gryffindors have more of a unified theme within their living quarters,_ she thought while observing Minerva's thinly veiled look of discomfort towards their settings.

She frowned at herself; irritated that she had been distracted by such petty things as furniture, when there were issues of greater import still left to be dealt with that morning.

Ahead of her, Pomona was casting silencing spells over the doorways of the rooms that were not to be affected by that evening's disturbance.

 _Severus would be casting wards_ , she thought idly as she walked quietly down the hallway.

She was drawn quickly from her critical thoughts as Pomona finally came to a stop in front of what she presumed was the 3rd year boys dorm.

"What bed is he in?" Poppy asked in a soft voice.

"Second on the right," the other woman answered resignedly.

_Of course Badgers are loyal to their own, but it's a bit ridiculous to hold such a high regard for someone involved in something like this!_

And yet, Poppy still had to force away a pang of guilt as she stepped aside to allow Kingsley into the room first. The boy was only in his third year; just a year older than Lee and the Zabini boy had been.

 _That_ thought certainly focused her mind.

Hoping against all hope that the boy would actually be _in_ his bed, she followed Kingsley into the room. The large man in front of her moved carefully, sliding easily through the dark room almost as though it was familiar territory.

She could hear Minerva's stiff legged attempts at silence, but ignored them in favor of trying to spot the boy where he supposedly lay in front of her.

Feeling almost ghoul-like, she made her way to the foot of the bed and nodded at Kingsley to move around onto the other side. Creeping along the long side closest to the doorway, she took a short steadying breath before quickly pulling the curtains open.

Kevin Stebbins lay on his side, his back to Kingsley, where he stood at the other side.

She heard Pomona cast yet another silencing spell from the foot of the bed, and rolled her eyes in annoyance at the level of coddling this woman was willing to go through for her house.

As she raised her wand in order to immobilize the boy without waking him up—as had been their plan—the 3rd year's eyes abruptly shot open; blazing bright green in the darkness before her. In the blink of an eye, Stebbins was upright and coming towards her throat with his fingers outstretched, before suddenly dropping back to the bed ramrod stiff.

Her heartbeat now beating wildly in her ears, Poppy raised shocked eyes to Kingsley who was shaking his head at her. A sound caught her ears from where Pomona and Minerva were standing, and she turned just in time to see Pomona faint dead away in the older woman's arms.

Stebbins continued to make growling noises in his throat until Kingsley silenced him as well. Seeing that Minerva's hands were full, Poppy magically conjured two floating stretchers.

Kingsley quickly moved the boy to one of the stretchers, before turning to help her levitate Pomona to the other.

Back in the infirmary, Kingsley moved the boy to a room that had magically appeared next to Ron Weasley's, while Poppy and Minerva both dealt with the Hufflepuff head of house.

And that's when Minerva informed her as to who was responsible for casting the _Petrificus Totalis_ spell.

"You should have seen her, Poppy," the other woman said, her face gray with exhaustion. "Disbelief right up until the end, and then when he tried to attack you, anger unlike what I've ever seen from her," Minerva told her; a steely glint shining out of her eyes as she spoke.

"From Pomona?" Poppy asked in disbelief.

"I think Hufflepuffs have a tendency to think of themselves as eternally innocent," Minerva sniffed disdainfully.

"Well, if she wanted evidence in the contrary to back up what I was trying to tell her, then she certainly got _that_ ," Poppy said quietly, turning to look at unconscious witch laid out beside them; ensconced in one of the infirmary's private rooms.

. . .

An hour or so after their retrieval of the Stebbins boy from his dormitory bed, Kingsley finally made it back to the quarters he seemed to now be sharing with Severus. Although his belongings had not yet made it there in full, one only had to look at the number of hours he spent in the dungeons in comparison with his flat in London.

There was no question of which location was the winner.

The rooms were as dark as when he had left, after being summoned by Poppy's Patronus—a tiny hummingbird—and largely seemed unchanged, except for one noticeable difference; his lover was no longer in their bed.

 _Their bed_ —that certainly was a thought and a half, provided that he ever let himself dwell on it, he smirked to himself. Quickly slipping off his boots—magic was a wonderful thing—he padded in stocking feet across the hallway to where Lee's room was.

Easing the door open gently, he wasn't surprised to see Severus sitting beside the boy's bed, watching him sleep by the light of the child's fluttering glass snitch.

Quietly, he made his way to the man's side and rested his hand lightly on Severus's shoulder.

"Come to bed, Severus," he whispered in gentle tones.

Gracefully, the other man stood up, not giving attention or voice to the stiffness that was he was likely feeling in his joints from sitting in a cold dark room for who knew how long.

Kingsley wrapped his arm around his lover's shoulders and moved them both back to their bed, furtively casting a warming charm on the blankets as he did so.

It was only after they were back in bed together, Severus's bedroom door closed and locked against casual intrusions—which Lee's nightmares were not considered—that the other man bothered to speak.

"Who was it?" Severus asked him quietly. "Which student did Poppy have you go after?"

"A third year by the name of Kevin Stebbins," he answered tiredly, as he pulled off his extraneous layers.

Severus looked away from him, his brow wrinkling as he thought.

"A Hufflepuff," Severus said towards him, an eyebrow raised in questioning at him.

"Yes, a Hufflepuff," Kingsley answered with a slow sigh.

"Perhaps we should focus on Ravenclaw next," Severus answered distractedly, his mind deep in thought.

"It does seem to be the logical progression," he agreed easily enough, quickly unbuttoning his lover's shirt.

"What are you doing?" Severus asked him sharply.

"You're cold. I'm attempting to warm you up," Kingsley replied with a serious look at the man beside him.

"And so therefore you decided to relieve me of my clothes?" Severus answered with a quirked eyebrow.

"Really Severus," Kingsley answered nonchalantly, successfully opening the other man's shirt and pulling it away.

"I know what you are trying to do," Severus stubbornly crossed his arms over his pale—yet surprisingly muscular—chest.

"And what am I trying to do?" Kingsley answered innocently, drawing the other man's chest to his own. He ran his heated hands over Severus's cold scarred back; maneuvering them farther under the covers as he did so.

Severus wasn't helping him, but he took it as a positive sign that the other man wasn't actively hexing him either.

"You are attempting not to have this conversation," Severus said from beside him with a still far too serious face, considering the attention that Kingsley's mouth was currently giving his nipples.

"I _am_ having a conversation," he stopped to suck the nipple into his mouth again, grazing it lightly with his teeth, and then popping his mouth off with an accompanying wet sound.

"Yes?" Severus asked, tension beginning to show in his face from keeping himself quiet.

"I just asked this nipple if it liked me, and it answered that yes it did—very much," Kingsley answered with a deep chuckle; his mouth positioned over the large vein in his lover's long neck as he did so.

Under his hands, Severus _shivered_ , but he knew that the cold no longer was the reason.

Looking down at his own now slightly reddened nipples, Severus turned back up towards him with a daring look in his eyes.

"I had no idea that you were so well versed in the art of nipple-speak."

"Something I picked up during my schooldays," he replied absently, now intent on divesting Severus and him both of their pants.

"Good to know that your informative years were spent pr-productively," Severus gasped as Kingsley's hand found his cock. Their pants were quickly removed and suddenly Kingsley found himself staring at the full naked beauty of his lover.

 _Also known as the full naked_ bounty _of my lover_ , he thought to himself as he took in the other man's looks appreciatively.

Severus's cock stood in thinly veiled interest, but Kingsley knew that he could change that with a few choice touches. The man's black hair was thick where it was present around his groin, but otherwise it appeared only very sparsely; allowing Kingsley to slide their bodies together without the extraneous itchiness that often accompanied the other men that he had dated.

He knew that his own body's smoothness often surprised new lovers; one even going as far as to ask whether or not he shaved himself, and if so, how he managed to keep his skin so perfect. That relationship had not lasted long, but it wasn't just the issue of hair that had ended it between them.

He hadn't meant to compare between them, but after being with Severus that first time, all later relationships had left him wanting.

Severus's looks, while certainly not classic in any sense of the word, were still beautiful in their own ways. True, his mouth tended towards angry scowls and cruel words, but Kingsley could put up with that as long as their kisses continued to leave him gasping. His lover's lips were hard, but his mouth was wet and his tongue _oh so_ talented.

His fingers were certainly deft and skilled enough at the art of potion making, but they also managed to touch Kingsley in ways that left him howling; finding new erogenous zones on Kingsley's body every time they touched him—playing him like a talented musician.

Kingsley moved his mouth to the insides of Severus's thighs—a place that had gone far too long without proper attention, if the sounds his lover was gasping out now said anything about it.

The skin was so very soft here; something even his lover's twitching leg muscles couldn't distract him from. He left a string of biting kisses up one side, before repeating the same process on the other leg.

"Kingsley, for the love of _Merlin_ ," Severus growled at him as he breathed tantalizing on the man's straining cock.

"I wouldn't want to distract you from your conversation Severus. What was it that you needed to talk to me about?" Kingsley asked wickedly, his head propped up on a hand, from where he was positioned less than a tongue's length from his lover's damp headed cock.

He eyed the beads of moisture appreciatively, even going so far as to delicately swipe his tongue over the tip for a taste; successfully putting an end to anything Severus had been about to say.

Leaning his head forwards, he gently put his lips around one of the other man's balls, sucking it into his mouth wetly, causing Severus to answer with a reflexive—"FUCK!"

Swirling his tongue around his mouthful like a piece of candy, he watched in amusement as Severus forced himself not to cry out again.

Letting go of his prize with a wet smacking sound, Kingsley looked back up at his lover with a lazy expression on his face.

"What was that Severus? I didn't quite hear you," he grinned up at his murderous looking boyfriend.

"For the _love_ of Merlin's _balls,_ Kay," Severus ground out between gritted teeth.

"Yes?"

"Either suck me or fuck me, Kay," Severus said in a low voice; the flush on his cheeks revealing his need. "Just _pick_ one— _now_."

. . .

Neville cried out softly as Draco's hand slipped into his pants and began stroking him.

"I don't think we sh-should—," Neville stuttered out before giving up, and closing his eyes to the pleasure.

His instincts were screaming out that this was _wrong_ , but the other boy's hand felt so _good_ on him.

 _Hand job_ , he thought vaguely, remembering something he had overheard from some older cousins of his.

"You like this," Draco whispered into his ear, causing a shiver to go down his spine.

They were alone in their dark room, together on Neville's bed. Neville had been sleeping until a moment before, when he had awoken to Draco kissing him.

"Y-Yesss," he hissed as Draco's hand began to pick up in speed.

Tendrils of pleasure were working their way through his stomach and back as Draco's hand kept pulling and twisting on him. Vaguely he could feel Draco's body as it rutted against his own, but it didn't really register in his current field of awareness.

A sense of urgency was bubbling through him as his body tried to reach its much needed level of bliss.

"Draco!" He growled, not recognizing his own voice as he did so.

His hips and Draco's hand were moving together as he felt it reach the peak, and he grabbed tightly onto the other boy's thin shoulders as he began to shudder with his release.

. . .

"Kay!" Severus keened loudly as the other man pounded into him, grazing his prostate with every pass.

Severus was on his hands and knees, slowly being fucked into the mattress by the ferocity of his lover's motions. His hair was hanging in his face, but he could care less. The sensations were what mattered now as Kingsley continued to plunder his arse with his cock.

Both men were dripping with sweat, and Severus wondered vaguely why his lover had ever thought him to be chilled.

His cock was straining to the upmost, begging to be allowed to come, but his position was barely stable enough as he was, without the added difficulty of trying to also touch himself.

"Please, please touch me," he found himself begging only moments later, as the need became too great to bear.

Kingsley transferred the hand that was still playing with his nipples down to his groin. The first touch was electric, and he groaned out loud at the sensation.

It took a few tries before Kingsley had synchronized his strokes on his cock and his strokes in Severus's arse, but before long, Severus was keening again. He was so _damn_ close to completion. It was shuddering through his muscles, gathering power in his loins, pulling itself alongside his pounding heart. It was need and want and an _almost there_ like quality that had nothing to do with words or _feelings_.

He was almost in _pain_ from the absolute closeness of the sensation.

Plunge—stroke—plunge—stroke—he was gasping now; eyes tightly closed as his muscles tightened themselves even farther. The pleasure danced enticingly just in front of them, if they could only just _reach_ it.

"Severus—you," a gasping breath was heard, "are so _beautiful._ Love you, love you, love you," Kingsley growled out into his shoulder.

 _Beautiful—_ him?

 _Love—_ him?

Kingsley was still murmuring those wonderfully delirious professions and Severus allowed himself to be coaxed by their meanings, by their promises of _more_.

He cried out as he finally came, covering Kingsley's hand with his cum, as his arse muscles tightened hard against the other man's cock that was still moving within him.

He fell forwards onto his face and heard Kingsley hitch a breath from behind him, before feeling him grind to a halt as he released himself into Severus's heated depths. They rested like that for a moment; their hearts still beating wildly and the heat from their bodies still rising between them, almost like a physical thing.

He felt Kingsley bracing himself as he began to pull ever so slowly out from Severus. And then they were free, and he could feel a thin trickle of cum running down the inside of his thigh. Kingsley lay down beside him, and pulled him up against his sweaty chest. Severus could still hear their hearts beating heavily against one another, although it was a slower dance than before.

Sated, with the feeling of euphoric bliss still tingling through his body, Severus turned to Kingsley and wandlessly cast a cleaning spell; instantly clearing away the cum and sweat that was beginning to dry into a sticky mess around them.

"Still love me?" He asked, feeling very stupid and happy with the question.

"Still love you," Kingsley agreed more solemnly, adding a kiss to Severus's now clean forehead.

"Not just before, during and after sex?" He asked, his eyes drooping shut tiredly.

"Especially then," his lover said with a snort against his shoulder. "But always too," he added quietly, dimming the lights almost down to nothing with his final admission.

"Love you," Severus admitted softly.

"Always?" Kingsley whispered into his ear.

He nodded his response into his lover's chest. Kingsley touched his head gently with his fingers; lightly running them through his hair and putting him further at ease.

It wasn't long before he was fast asleep, wrapped tightly in his lover's safe arms.

. . .

Lee awoke the next morning to discover his father and Kingsley already awake and active within the main room of their quarters. Spread out across the dining table were many parchments of varying lengths and widths; all filled with various designs and directions that made little sense to the still tired boy.

"Dad?" He asked hesitantly to the dark haired man currently engaged in a serious conversation with Kingsley at the other end of the table.

Severus turned towards him with a small smile on his face, and Lee breathed a sigh of relief that the man was no longer angry at him.

"Good morning child," his father said, quickly going to him and pulling him into a secure hug. Lee hugged back, pushing his face into the soft material of his father's robes, holding on for longer than usual as he tried to regain his emotional equilibrium.

"Morning dad," he said softly as he finally released his grasp on his father.

"What are you and Kingsley doing?" Lee asked curiously.

His father looked at Kingsley with a wry expression before turning and explaining the situation to him.

"So these are all of your potential plans for how to get _revenge_ on the Dursleys?" Lee asked after Severus had stopped speaking.

"Only some of them," Kingsley added with a short laugh.

Lee raised an eyebrow of his own. He felt sure that he had pulled it off correctly, given his father's responding snort and Kingsley's own incredulous look.

For a moment, he watched in silence as Kingsley looked back and forth between him and his father.

"Something you find interesting, Kay?" Severus asked him with a smirk.

"You are aware that there are two of you now, yes Severus?"

Severus looked at Lee, a smile quirking at the corner of his lips, before answering.

"And you just _now_ realized this?" His father asked with a smirk towards the slightly larger man.

Lee giggled at his father's response.

"I think I'm outnumbered here Severus," Kingsley replied, his hands held up in mock surrender.

"As well you should be," Severus said, giving them both a short, but real smile, before turning back to their plans.


	64. Unveiling the Truth (Or at least some of it)

"Dad?"

Severus looked down at the child perched comfortably in his lap.

"Child?"

"Kingsley is family now, right?"

Severus fought against an entirely inappropriate smirk and nodded.

"So what should I call him?"

"Pardon?"

"Well, _you're_ family too, right?" The boy's eyes were staring intently up at him.

"Correct," he replied with a small proud smile.

"And I don't call you Severus anymore, yeah?"

Severus had a feeling he finally knew where this was going.

"No, although you may still do so—if you wish," he answered.

"I like calling you dad," his child smiled shyly at him.

Severus tightened his grip on the boy in response to the little rush those few words put through his chest.

They sat in comfortable silence for a few more moments before Lee continued.

"So what should I call Kingsley?"

Severus thought on that question seriously, before finally coming to the conclusion that his lover needed to be present for this as well.

Hoisting the child over his shoulder, he walked with a giggling boy over to his bedroom where Kingsley was currently ensconced. Ever since making his way into their lives, Kingsley had begun stealing away every evening when Severus and his son had their "holding time"—as Michael Turnskell had referred to it those long months ago—in order to allow them some privacy.

But now, Severus was purposely interrupting that separateness, in hopes that Kingsley might be able to save him from getting anymore in over his head.

"Kingsley? Lee and I would like a word, if you please," he said congenially enough to the door of his bedroom.

"Can he hear you through that?" Lee asked from where he was slung over Severus's shoulder.

"He can," Severus said with a smirk, not bothering to inform the boy of the charms on the door that allowed for messages to be passed easily back and forth, should the need arise.

Severus returned them to the couch, just in time to see the door open to reveal an intrigued looking Kingsley.

. . .

Lee had thought about the problem of what to call Kingsley for several weeks, before finally bringing the issue up to his father. Having a real—live—parent was a dream come true for him, but the idea that he might be able to gain _two_ parents in the process was simply amazing.

Sure, he wasn't like one of those perfect kids in the fairy tales or even like those families he had surreptitiously watched on the telly late at night from his cupboard, but he could still have _two_ parents nonetheless. He didn't have a mummy and a daddy, but he still could have a _Kingsley_ and a daddy.

The thought made him grin stupidly to himself late at night when he was alone in his bed. He would hug himself tightly as the bright emotions bubbled within his torso; squeezing the knowledge closely against his body as the thrill rode through him.

It had occurred to him one night that if Kingsley _were_ going to be gaining such a role as being the equal to his father, then it would only make sense if the man were given his own parental _title_ —didn't it?

He already _had_ a daddy—technically he had had two—but since he couldn't remember the first one, he didn't feel that he really had to count the first one as being real.

 _Severus_ was his _daddy_ —his _real_ daddy—because he was the one that made their family happen to begin with. He was the one who had _rescued_ him; had cared for him when he was in the lowest of all lows. Severus had been the first to _love_ him that he could actually _remember_.

So then, saying that he had a Kingsley and a daddy—well, that was wrong, wasn't it? He had Kingsley and Severus; and Severus was his _daddy_ , but Kingsley, who was beginning to show Lee that he was rather important in his own way, needed to have a name—a title—as well.

It had taken a few more nights of mulling over this thought before Lee finally had had his epiphany.

Kingsley couldn't be _daddy_ , because Lee already had one of _those_ , but Kingsley could still be his _papa_ —provided that he didn't mind.

Papa and Daddy—not quite the same feel as Mummy and Daddy, but he didn't mind the differences, because ultimately, the only thing that mattered was being together with them as a _family_.

Family had been a poisonous word to him for almost as long as he could remember. He'd try to squash down the sense of longing he got whenever he was around Weasleys, or the Grangers, or hell, even the Dursleys, but it had been hard. He had never been a part of one in all of his memories; he had never _belonged_ to one, and he had never known what it was like to truly fit _in_.

And now he could, and now he _did_ , and truly, it was a glorious feeling.

. . .

"Kingsley, Lee has a question to ask you," Severus said to him after he had sat down next to them.

"I'm listening," he said with a small encouraging smile.

Across from him, sitting in his lover's lap, was a rather anxious looking Lee.

He didn't know what this was about, but he had rather hoped that the boy had gotten past his fear of him.

"I—I was thinking," the child began, glancing at Severus for support, before looking back at him.

"Yes?" He prompted gently.

"Well," the boy said, taking a deep breath, "You're family now, aren't you? You're one of _us_ ," he said, flicking his eyes back up at Severus for a moment.

Still not knowing what this was about, he nodded his head in affirmation.

"So, I—I was w-wondering," the child's voice had gotten very soft. Kingsley leaned in closer to hear him, taking the boy's small hands in his own as he did so.

"What were you wondering?" He asked softly, encouragingly.

"Could-I-call-you-papa?" The child said in a rush.

"Could you repeat that Lee? I'm afraid I didn't understand you."

The boy took another fortifying breath before asking his question again.

"Could I call you Papa?"

The child was looking at him with wide eyes; his face a combination of fear and hope as he waited for Kingsley's answer.

Kingsley—for his part—didn't quite know what to say, other than— _really?_

Realizing he had been sitting there dumbfounded for a few seconds too long, he made an attempt to say something—only to be cut off by an increasingly flummoxed child.

"It'd be okay if you didn't want to. Really, just forget I ever said anything; it's not, it's n-not a b-b-big deal," the boy stammered while his cheeks turned pink.

Not quite daring to look his lover in the eye, he kept his eyes on the boy and waited patiently for the child's flow of words to come to a halt.

"Would you like to call me Papa?" He asked in that brief moment of silence.

The boy was hesitant before nodding energetically at him.

"I would be _honored_ for you to call me papa," Kingsley answered in a deep and serious voice.

"Just as I would be _honored_ to call you my son," he added.

. . .

Lee didn't know what was wrong with him. He had just gotten everything he'd ever wanted: a home and _two_ loving parents.

Why on earth was he crying _now_?

He shoved his face against his daddy's chest and shuddered out his emotions onto the front of the man's robes.

Distantly, he felt hands on his back, rubbing his tense muscles and soothing his overwhelming feelings with their gentle touches.

Whose hands were they? Were they both men's or were they just his daddy's?

He took a quivering breath and turned his face back out into the light, towards Kingsley—his _papa_.

"That's all it takes?" He asked in a watery voice.

Confusion showed on his _papa's_ face at his question, and he could feel his daddy shifting his muscles from where he was sprawled against him.

"All what takes?" His _papa_ asked.

"For you to want me?" He asked in a squeaky voice.

Understanding dawned on his papa's face and he felt—more than a heard—a growl come from his daddy's chest.

"The Dursleys," he heard his father snarl out from above him.

"Were—and are— _monsters_ ," his papa finished; looking at him intently as he spoke.

"They said _I_ was the freak," he whispered.

"I know," his papa answered with eyes full of both sadness and fury.

"They said, they said—," he tried to tell them what his aunt and uncle had said about him, but he was silenced by a stern look from his _parents_ that caused him to lose his train of thought.

_Parents!_

There was that warm rush through his chest again that caused him to hold onto his daddy just that much tighter.

He felt his daddy's thin fingers begin stroking the back of his head and he smiled up at the man.

. . .

Severus looked down at his son, still stroking the child's unruly black hair, and realized that the boy was smiling up at him. For a moment, he felt the corners of his own mouth turning upwards in response, before dropping the expression completely as he turned to look back at his lover.

"You see Lee," Kingsley was speaking again. " _I've_ been in the Dursley's home. Thanks to the memories that the house held of you and its occupants, I've also _witnessed_ nearly everything that they _did_ to you."

His son's eyes widened in unmitigated horror at his lover's words, and would have scrambled off of Severus's lap if he had not caught the boy. He pulled the child in tightly against his chest and continued stroking the boy's hair, even as the tremors started up once more in his son's thin frame.

"You—you _saw?"_ His son cried out in distress as he shook within Severus's embrace.

"Yes, yes I did," Kingsley growled out—allowing his anger to take control of his features for once. "And that's why your daddy and I are working on plans to make the remainder of their lives _truly_ miserable," he added.

"And you still want me?" His son was still stuck on the previous topic.

"Listen to me Lee," Kingsley took the child's face in his much larger hands. "The Dursley's _abused_ you. They _physically_ abused you and they _emotionally_ abused you, but the worst of what they did was _sexually_ abuse you."

Severus's hands stilled as he wrapped his arms more tightly around his son.

"They—they," his son stammered disjointedly.

The boy's hands were twitching spasmodically against his chest and Severus hurt even more for his son.

"They _sexually_ abused you," Kingsley repeated gently.

"Sexually?" Lee whispered in disbelief—making it all too clear to Severus that the child had not truly yet realized the serious extent of the actions the Dursleys had partaken in against him.

"What they did whenever they hurt your privates, or showed you _theirs_ —that was _sexual_ abuse. When they hit you anywhere else, and when they neglected you, that was _physical_ abuse. When they laughed at you, spoke cruelly to you, and when your uncle and cousin _threatened_ your life—that's all considered _verbal_ and _emotional_ abuse, Lee."

His lover's eyes were the only visibly angry part of his countenance now. He knew that the other man was purposely keeping himself calm for his child's sake.

His son was staring wide-eyed up at Kingsley, barely blinking as the words slowly registered within his mind.

"And what's more Lee, is that you did not _deserve_ _any of that_ ," Kingsley said in a gravelly voice just slightly above a whisper.

"But I was bad," his son whispered.

"Lee," his lover said sadly to his son, " _no one_ deserves to be treated like that. You were never _bad_ enough to deserve any of that," the man continued. "The Dursleys are the only ones at fault here. You did _nothing_ wrong; _nothing_ at all."

"Furthermore, no matter how _bad_ you might act from now on out, your daddy and I will _never_ hurt you like that; regardless of what you do, or how angry we might get, we will never _abuse_ you like they did."

"But—," his son began, only to be cut off by Kingsley once more.

"No Lee. There is nothing you could do that would warrant such an inhuman response. The Dursleys are monsters, and I promise you that they will _pay_ for what actions they have committed against you."

. . .

Lee had been dosed with dreamless sleep and put to bed, and now Severus and Kingsley sat in their sitting room surrounded by the other House heads, listening to Poppy reveal what she had learned from her brief but memorable foray into Flint's consciousness.

Poppy appeared older to Minerva that evening; almost as though she were weighed down with the knowledge that she was about to pass onto the rest of the room.

Perhaps equally troubling for the Gryffindor head of house was the appearance of the woman sitting to her right—Pomona Sprout.

 _She looks positively worn out_ , she thought in dismay.

Minerva knew that it had been hard for the typically amicable woman to use magic _against_ one of her own students, but it had been a _necessary_ action; something that she had tried to emphasize to Pomona upon her revival to the conscious world.

Her eyes roamed over the rest of the room's occupants. It no longer surprised her to see Kingsley and Severus sitting together; somehow, they seemed to make a good working team, although she would never have believed such a thing to be possible before that year.

She glanced back at Pomona with a frown, before returning a thoughtful look to Kingsley's unusually withdrawn countenance. Something was niggling in her memories as she looked between the two of them; something that she had known before, but no longer could place her finger on.

. . .

Poppy looked out on the group before her with more than a touch of sadness at the news she had to deliver to them. The stress of the unusual year was beginning to weigh down each of them, and she dearly hoped that this new information would not send any overburdened systems into shock.

"Most of you have probably heard about what happened in the Hufflepuff dorms the night before last," she started out slowly enough.

She watched as Pomona's face became even whiter than it had been at her words.

"After Mr. Flint's arrest, I called in a few favors to allow me a few minutes with him. It is the knowledge that I gleaned from that time spent with him that permitted me to make the connection between Kevin Stebbins and the Fless problem," she said in a slow voice.

She had to choose her next words carefully; the others—save Severus and Kingsley—didn't know that she was a natural Legilimens, and she would prefer to keep it that way.

Methodically, she began to lay it out for them.

"Fless is a drug created from the dregs of a specially _modified_ potion by the name of _Amortentia-Perpetuus_."

The room was silent save for a deep inhale from the man sitting to her right.

"Severus? Can you help the room to understand more about this potion?" She asked.

Severus's eyes were wider than his usual narrow eyed glare; a change in expression that certainly did not escape the rest of the room's occupants.

"Are you sure Poppy?" He asked her in a very low voice; the shock still clear in his expression and his tense pose.

She knew that what he was really asking was whether she was sure of the potion's _name_ , and unfortunately she was.

"Yes, Severus," she said with a sad smile.

. . .

Severus breathed deeply a few times before speaking to the others. The information that Poppy had just given them had struck him to his core, and he was sure from the dumb expressions before him that the others in the room had not yet fully understood the extent of the danger they were now facing.

How he loathed to always be forced to be the bearer of bad news.

 _Yet what Poppy wants . . ._ his thoughts trailed off.

" _Amortentia-Perpetuus_ ," he began in a deathly quiet voice, "is a modification on the more widely known potion _Amortentia—_ also known as a 'Love Potion,'" his face took on more of its traditional sneer with those words.

The group was nodding silently at him, indicating their understanding.

"Since one can not _force_ another to truly _love_ them—unless the feeling is already reciprocated in the person they are dosing—then it might actually be more prudent to refer to this potion as a 'Lust Potion,'" he added.

 _Perhaps they shall remember that the next time that Valentine's Day comes around_ , he thought angrily.

"On the other hand, _Amortentia-Perpetuus_ is a potion that was only recently developed, perhaps less than fifty years ago, that causes the _victim_ to love—or lust— _without ceasing_ ," he said, looking at each of them in the eye to insure that they understood the heinous quality of what he was speaking of.

A troubled looking Minerva raised the first question.

"You said less than fifty years ago, correct Severus?" She asked with faraway eyes.

"Yes," he bit out wearily.

"Who was the potion's creator?"

He paused, the words catching sharply on his tongue.

"Severus," Minerva prompted more forcefully.

"It is largely believed that the potion was a creation of the brilliant mind of the young _Tom Riddle_."

Beside him, his lover flinched ever so slightly at his words.

"Later known as Lord Voldemort," Minerva said a small voice.

"Correct," Severus said in a hoarse voice.

The room was silent as the group processed what they had said.

"Severus," the quiet was broken by the quivering voice of Pomona.

He turned his eyes to her and forced himself to be patient.

"How is the potion modified?"

Abruptly, images of Lucius Malfoy standing over Lee, raping the child and coming to the sound of his crying pleas filled his mind with a sickening level of clarity.

"There is an additional component that can only be gotten from an unwilling source," he answered.

In his mind, he saw his son during one of the boy's more violent flashbacks, tearing and ripping at his skin and screaming at the top of his lungs.

"Which is?" The prompt given by the plump woman was hesitantly given.

He could _hear_ Lucius calling his son a _whore_ as he manipulated the boy's physical needs into something much more brutal.

The room had gone very still by the time he opened his eyes again. He hadn't even been aware of closing them to begin with.

"Severus?"

"Sperm must be taken from an unwilling male. The younger the male, the more potent the drug," he finished, whispering the last of it while he stared unceasingly at the floor of his quarters.


	65. Parents

Severus didn't want to sit there any longer in that interminable meeting. He didn't want to talk about the horrors that his son and the children of his house had experienced. He didn't want to keep _thinking_ about the things that had caused his son so much pain.

Instead, he _wanted_ to go check in on his son and watch him sleep. The child's rest would be undisturbed that night because of the dreamless sleep they had given him before bed.

There was nothing he wanted to do more than watch his son quietly pass the nighttime hours.

He was on his feet before he quite knew what had come over him. He passed Poppy with a mumbled excuse that he promptly forgot, and within a few long strides, he soon found himself standing in the darkened bedroom of his son.

He passed easily through the room; his eyes adjusting quickly to the semi-darkness that constantly shifted as his son's blinking snitch continued its progression through the room.

Not bothering to transfigure a chair next to his child's bed, he instead sat himself on the edge of the boy's bed, next to his son's prone form.

Stroking his fingers through child's black hair—and inwardly marveling at its softness—he let out a breath of relief that the boy was just the way he had imagined him.

"I am sorry, my little one," he whispered; the words causing the muscles in his chest to contract painfully.

The next time he blinked, he was surprised to find his lover standing beside him, one hand resting on his shoulder.

"Severus? Are you all right?"

He felt like laughing at the ludicrous question.

Taking his silence for an answer, Kingsley spoke again.

"Poppy finished telling us the rest of the details. Since you still weren't back, I showed them all out. I expect you're bound to get a few questions tomorrow about our relationship because of it."

Severus didn't answer. He was staring at the child who had somehow managed to teach him how to love again. He wondered what he possibly could have done right in his life to deserve the devotion of such a wonderful little boy.

"Severus?"

"See how peaceful he is, Kingsley?"

"Yes, I do," his lover's words were softly spoken next to his head.

"He says he loves me. I think he really does," his voice was rough.

"Of course he does. You are the most important person in the world to him, Severus."

"I don't deserve him," he admitted painfully, his breath catching deep in his throat.

"I think you're the only one who does," Kingsley replied from where he had crouched down beside him.

"I'm not going to let them win," he said; the determination creeping back into his voice.

 _They_ had already won too much, taken too many spoils of war.

 _But not again_ , he swore viciously to himself.

 _Never_ again.

. . .

The next morning, Lee hesitantly made his way into the main room of their quarters.

He saw Severus sitting at the table, eating what looked like a piece of toast smothered in blackberry jam. His stomach growled at the sight, but before he could make his way over to his father's side, Kingsley appeared.

Feeling very red in the face, he stammered out a greeting.

"Good morning papa," he said softly, his heart beating loudly in his ears.

"Good morning son," his papa said with a gentle smile down at him.

No longer able to handle the anxiety fluttering around in his stomach, he quickly made his way over to the table and into his daddy's lap. He promptly shoved his face into Severus's robes and curled himself into a small trembling ball.

True, he had _wanted_ this, but now that he was getting it, he wasn't at all sure how to handle the myriad of shifting emotions that accompanied it.

. . .

Severus looked down at his SLOB with an upturned eyebrow. Wiping his hands on a spare napkin, he reached down to the boy and placed his arms securely around his back. He looked up and saw with interest that his lover was looking on, seemingly rather discomfited at the boy's current state.

"Ah, excellent point, Lee," he began, as though his son had spoken.

"Sev?" Kingsley asked him quietly, a worried look marring his otherwise handsome face.

"Let me introduce you two; Kay, this is my SLOB," he said with a devilish grin.

"SLOB, Severus?"

"Also known as my Small Lump Of Boy," he added with a smirk.

"Does this— _he_ appear often?"

"Only when he is uncomfortable, I assure you."

They stared in silence at each other for a moment before Severus's attention was once more drawn down to the small boy in his lap.

. . .

Lee had managed to calm himself in the time that his daddy was talking to his papa, and now that he felt safe again, he realized that breakfast was only an arm's length away.

Seeing that his daddy's attention was still on his papa— _his papa!—_ he deftly reached out and snagged his daddy's half eaten piece of toast and quickly finished it off.

. . .

When Severus looked down again, he saw two things: his son licking his fingers next to a distinctly empty breakfast plate.

"Brat!" He said, trying to glare at his son.

However, his son disarmed him with a sweet smile, and he found his annoyance quickly evaporate into something more manageable.

"Lee, where has my toast gone?"

The child in his lap looked thoughtful before aiming a look at Kingsley.

"Papa stole it when you weren't looking," was the mischievous reply.

"Why on earth would your papa steal my toast? He has already had _his_ breakfast."

Delighted that his daddy was playing along, the child arranged his face in a more serious expression, and thought for a moment before replying.

"He couldn't help it daddy," was the faux innocent answer.

Severus shot a look at his lover and was further amused to see a mystified look on the man's face.

"And why could he not 'help it'?"

"Well, 'cause you just made it look so good!"

Severus snorted in surprise nearly at the same moment that his lover started laughing.

Minus the few sticky remnants left on his son's mouth and fingers, the boy was the absolute picture of cherubic innocence.

"Does this mean you would like some of my breakfast as well?"

"Well, I _would_ , but since papa already ate it, I guess I'll have to have some of my own," his son said with a cheeky grin.

Severus couldn't help but roll his eyes as he moved the boy over to a chair of his own.

. . .

In another room—one far less pleasant than most—there sat a girl.

She wore a shapeless graying dress over a body that looked much the same.

There was a rip up the side of it, under which lay an adjacently placed deep red welt. Her feet were bare and icy to the touch—much like the rest of her.

In fact, her eyes were the only part of her body that was not cold and dull. Rather, they burned with contempt for all they beheld, including herself.

Every day a man would visit her, and every day, the visit would result in two things: a new dress with a new rip, and food.

She always got these two things, regardless of whether she played the man's games or not.

It didn't matter what she did.

It simply didn't matter.

. . .

"Hufflepuff hasn't got a chance," Lee countered.

"Have you seen their Seeker? I bet he could go pro someday, if he wanted," Teddy Nott responded in a serious voice.

"Gryffindor has the best overall team this year—no matter what."

"Look, I would agree with you if you were still playing this season, but without you, Gryffindor might as well not be playing," Teddy answered with a shrug.

"Come off it; they're not _that_ bad. Are they?" Lee asked with some uncertainty.

"Well, I'll give 'em this: if they can somehow distract the other team's Seeker for long enough to work up an overwhelming lead, then they might have a chance. But the kid they have playing Seeker now isn't worth the amount of talent you have in your little toe."

Lee felt his cheeks turning pink with the praise, even as the guilt tumbled in his stomach.

They were sitting in the Quidditch bleachers next to Severus and Kingsley, watching the Slytherin – Ravenclaw game. The Snitch hadn't been seen for over an hour, and even though the play put forth by the Chasers and Beaters was interesting, it wasn't enough to keep their full attentions.

. . .

Beside the two boys, Severus and Kingsley were engaged in a conversation of their own as well.

"You need to talk with him Sev," his lover argued.

"I needn't do any such thing," Severus said with a glare.

"Severus."

He sighed and looked Kingsley in the eye.

"He asked _me_ whether sex always had to hurt so badly."

Severus stiffened and clenched his jaw down against his anger. It wouldn't do to start hexing the other students, especially in front of so many witnesses.

"Maybe it's because he's worried about you."

His lover's calm statement broke him out of his fury and he shot him a disbelieving look in response.

"Or maybe it's because he's interested in someone," Kingsley offered with a shrug towards the two boys sitting beside Severus.

Severus looked at the two twelve year-olds and his eyes widened as he realized what his lover had suggested.

"They are much too young," he growled in a low voice.

"So were we."

Severus swallowed hard against the rush of memories those words caused him to recall.

"In that sense, they are clearly oblivious to one another," he sneered.

"Perhaps, but then again, perhaps not; all it takes is one moment, Severus."

He would never admit it, but Kingsley's words filled him with terror. His son had already been through so much, but now that puberty—specifically the hormones that accompanied it—was threatening to invade their lives, he knew how easily the situation could deteriorate even further.

"You're his papa— _you_ talk with him."

His lover gave him an incredulous look that easily conveyed how idiotic he thought Severus's suggestion had been.

"What?" Severus huffed, crossing his arms defensively.

"He can barely stand to call me _papa_ without blushing. How on earth are we to discuss sex?"

"How did he manage to ask you the other question then?"

"Honestly?"

"Yes," was Severus's tersely spoken answer.

"He didn't ask me," his lover shrugged, looking away from him.

"Kingsley." It was his turn to be annoyingly inquisitive.

"Poppy picked up on it the last time she talked to him. Apparently it was floating at the front of his mind," was the apologetic response.

Severus didn't know how to reply to that. He had hoped that Kingsley had just made up the statement in order to get his attention. He would have been angry with the other man, but he would have gotten over it.

 _But this_ , he thought helplessly.

 _What was he to do with_ this _?_

. . .

The girl's room had no windows for her to escape through—literally or figuratively. Instead, the space was lit only by one single candle that never went out.

There was no running water.

No bed, save her pile of old and worn out dresses.

No toilet.

No furniture.

"It is a tomb," she whispered hoarsely to the empty room.

Unfortunately, there was to be no escape for her by death.

She had already tried _that_. No, the monsters that kept her inside this dank prison wanted her _alive_. They wanted her well enough to scream and beg.

Why else would they want _her?_

. . .

"Son?" Severus said one evening after dinner.

"Dad?" He asked.

"There's something important that I've been meaning to discuss with you."

Lee looked at his father in mild trepidation.

"Yeah?" He answered, turning to look at his father.

They were sitting side by side on the couch, and up until that point, Lee had been enjoying their quiet evening alone with his dad. His papa was helping Poppy that evening in the infirmary and wouldn't be back until much later.

Lee studied his father's face. The man looked tense.

It made him even more nervous to realize that see his dad like this.

He shivered and drew his knees up to his chest protectively.

. . .

Severus shook his head, angry at himself that his son was reacting so badly.

"What are you frightened of Lee?" He asked softly.

"Is someone trying to take me away from you, dad?"

Actually there was, as Dumbledore had finally pulled his head out of the sand and had begun demanding that Severus immediately give up all parental rights to the boy-who-lived.

But with Poppy and her brother on his side—not to mention Kingsley and a host of others—there wasn't a chance in hell that he would give into his idiotic employer. Of course, that meant that his job was likely to be in jeopardy now, but then again, when was it not?

He spoke none of this to his son, however. There was nothing the boy could do about it except worry, and in his mind, his son already did far too much of that as it was.

"No more than the usual bumbling idiots," he answered seriously; wrapping an arm around his son's rigid shoulders as he pulled the boy in close against his side.

Somehow—he suspected that Kingsley had the most to do with this facet of their lives—they had thus far managed to keep Lee's adoption out of the papers. Although, how much longer that reprieve would last would be anyone's guess. They had finally begun getting a trickle of angry mail from a number of different sources; each sender linked to the other by only one common tie: at least one child currently in Gryffindor, Hufflepuff or Ravenclaw.

It was only a matter of time before the floodgates opened, but he hoped that he would at least be able to spare his son from the worst of it.

"No, this discussion has more to do with your upcoming teenage years," Severus said, squeezing his son's shoulders gently.

"I understand that for reasons beyond our control, you are less innocent than many your age," he said, picking his words carefully.

"But?" His child asked timidly; ever perceptive of Severus's body language.

"There are still many things that you do not know. This conversation is an attempt to rectify that lack of knowledge."

Severus remembered his own teenage years with more clarity than he would have cared for.

Poppy, for all of her interest in keeping her patients healthy and relatively informed, had actually been less than helpful in teaching the younger Severus about the mysteries of sex. Ultimately, he had been left with an outdated pamphlet—from before his mother's day, he had surmised from the spells mentioned—and then waved in the direction of the so-called pertinent section of the library.

The books he had found there had merely further confused him, and largely had caused him more trouble.

He also remembered the sex talk that his father had given him shortly before his third year.

After shoving a muggle condom in his hand, his father had warned him off of getting any young "bitches" pregnant, and bringing anymore little Snapes home.

" _One snaggle toothed, ugly whore of a son is already one too many,"_ the drunk bastard had told him.

Thank Merlin the man had never realized his son was a pouf.

"This is a time in your life when most young people begin experimenting to find out what it is that they like," he said to his son.

"I don't think I could ever do anything with someone else, daddy," his son whispered, shaking his head in the negative.

"And why is that?"

"'Cause I don't want anybody else to get hurt," was the whispered reply.

Severus resolutely pushed the sea of angry mental images away from the forefront of his mind as he sought to keep his sole attention on the boy in front of him.

"Son, sex doesn't always have to involve pain."

Bright green eyes looked at him uncertainly.

"In fact, when done _correctly_ , sex can be very enjoyable for _both_ people involved."

He purposely failed to mention anything about sado-masochism or group sex; thinking that the boy was not ready to hear about those two categories yet.

_Odd; I've been so worried about Lee's reactions that I've forgotten to be uncomfortable._

"Even when guys, you know, do it?" The uncertainty was back.

Something knotted hard inside of him at his son's question, but he tried to keep it from showing on his face.

"Yes. Even when guys 'do it,'" he smiled at the boy who was wedged in hard against his side.

"How?" The question sounded as though it had been forcefully wrenched out of his son's mouth.

"Several things are involved: having two willing partners, using lube or a lubricating spell that is not _water_ based, making sure that the one on the receiving end is relaxed and has been adequately prepared, and being able to give your trust to the other person, with the knowledge that your faith in them will be rewarded."

"I didn't have any of those with Lucius," his boy whispered shamefully, his cheeks turning pink.

 _That wasn't your fault!_ He wanted to shout angrily in frustration.

"No, you did not," he replied instead. "A fact that was entirely his fault, I assure you."

His son turned his face against Severus's arm and mumbled something indistinct.

Gently, Severus moved the boy's head back into the light, and insisted that the child repeat what he had said.

"I should have fought harder," was his son's heartbreaking reply.

"It was not your fault. There was nothing you could do," he countered. "Lucius had your wand. He is more than twenty years your senior and is a fully trained wizard. He is nearly twice as big as you are, and certainly stronger."

"Stronger than you?" His son interjected a touch fearfully.

Severus snorted derisively.

"Hardly," he spat contemptuously. He felt justified when the fear left his son's eyes.

"You did what you felt was right."

"And it didn't do any good," the bitterness was back in his son's voice.

"In one sense, no it did not. On the other hand, you proved to your friends how far you would go to protect them."

At least what had happened to his son was the result of the child trying to save his friends from a similar fate.

His own rape at the hands of the sadistic bastard in question was far less complex. The other man had wanted something.

Lucius Malfoy had never been denied something he had wanted.

And he had wanted Severus.

Severus simply had not felt the same way about him.

He had tried to deny a Malfoy, and look what he had gotten in return: a buggered arsehole and the loss of his dignity.

"I am _most_ proud of you son. It took true bravery to publicly stand up for your friends in the face of such overwhelming odds."

His son's cheeks were aflame once more, but shame had nothing to do with it this time.

"But it didn't do any good," the helpless look had returned to his son's face.

Severus lifted his hand to his son's head and began stroking his hair lightly. He felt, more than saw, his son snuggle further into his side, easing some of his own tension as well.

"Sometimes the act of publicly admitting a truth that you know will cause you trouble is the true sign of courage. Your friends, although injured, still managed to survive the experience."

"Except Hermione."

His son's chest hitched, even though the boy's eyes were dry.

"Do not assume automatically that just because she is missing, she is dead."

The boy's chest hitched again and he twisted himself around until his head was resting in Severus's lap.

"Can we not talk about this anymore right now?"

Severus bowed his head sadly.

"As you wish, child."

His son blindly reached out a hand to his own and pulled on it, and then pointed at his own head.

Severus smiled sadly at his son and reached down to continue stroking his child's soft locks. He noted with interest that the boy's hair had grown past his ears, and he wondered why the child had not mentioned it to him.

 _Perhaps he likes having his hair longer_.

_I can understand that._


	66. Expanding Without a Trace

"Did you clean up your room like I asked yesterday, Lee?" Severus asked after issuing him a good morning a few days later.

"Uh—," he started, before being cut off with a sharp glare from his father.

"Don't lie to me."

Lee fidgeted in his chair under the intensity of his father's eyes. He wished that they could just go on with breakfast instead of having this discussion.

"No sir," he said in a small voice, dropping his eyes to look resolutely at his plate.

"Son," his dad reached out a larger hand and rested it on his shoulder. "You know you can't enjoy your room like this. I just want you to be happy."

He nodded shakily, peeking up at Severus warily.

Removing his hand from Lee's shoulder, his father nodded resolutely before speaking again.

"You are to come directly back here after classes today, and you will take care of this then, understand me?"

"Could Teddy come?"

"No son. I expect you to have this done by the time I arrive home for the evening. Then we'll discuss having Mr. Nott over."

His father gave him a significant look before returning to his breakfast.

Lee didn't know exactly how he and Theodore "Teddy" Nott had become such good friends in so little time, but regardless, they had. Teddy wasn't anything like Ron, and maybe that's why they had hit it off so well; not because Lee was actively comparing between the two boys, but rather because Teddy understood—like he did—about the darker side of humanity.

And until this latest series of events, Ron had not.

. . .

"Lucius," the sound shuddered against his eardrums.

"Master," he answered, not quite looking up from the book in his hands.

A hand clenched painfully down around his chin, forcing his face upwards.

"Tell me Lucius," the deathly quiet voice said; cold eyes staring into his own. "How many are left?"

"Two," he answered casually, not at all sure where this was going.

"Suspicion is growing," the man looming over him hissed malevolently, finally releasing his face with a sharp twist of nails against Lucius's neck.

Lucius could feel blood trickling down his neck from where he had just been scratched, but knew better than to attend to himself in the presence of this man.

He turned his grimace into a sneer instead.

"And of the whole, what do they know? Nothing," he answered in a placating voice.

"It's nearly time," his master answered with a throaty growl. "I will not have my carefully laid plans destroyed because of your insatiable need for a good _fuck_ , Lucius," his master hissed distastefully.

Lucius fought to keep his mouth shut, knowing all too well that his pleas would fall on apathetic ears.

Surely the other man could remember that their plot had been far more complex than providing him with compliant whores.

"We could have this entire school on its _knees_ before the outside world had opened its eyes," he argued half-heartedly.

"And then what, my dear Lucius? Perhaps a cult?" They were standing chest to chest, both men eyeing the other disdainfully.

Lightning fast, his master's hand reached out and grabbed his crotch in a tight knuckled fist, causing Lucius to wheeze around the sudden flare of nauseating pain.

Lucius still clearly remembered the excruciating horror that his master had inflicted on him the last time he had displeased him. He knew that a lesser man would have been cowed by such an experience, but as a Malfoy, it had simply served as a rather extreme reminder of where exactly his boundaries lay with the more _powerful_ monster standing before him.

"I want them cut off, _Lucius_ , before I decide to do the same to you. Understand me?"

He nodded his head jerkily, not trusting his voice to remain even.

His master hissed in his face and then released him. It was only after watching his master exit the room that Lucius allowed himself to sink gently to the floor, his face frozen in a grimace of pain.

. . .

Lee did as his father had instructed earlier that day, going straight home and cleaning his room quickly. He had put Teddy off with an apology and promised to speak to him later that evening if possible.

Now done, he looked at the space around him with a tired grin. He sat down on his bed and put his head down on the pillow. Accomplice—his stuffed dragon—wandered over to where he lay and stuffed his snout in Lee's face.

"So you want attention, do you?" He asked with a laugh, hugging the soft plush toy to his chest tightly.

"I have a _room_ now, Accomplice. I'm _allowed_ to get it _messy_ even. Did you know that? And Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia can't lay a _finger_ on me for it," he whispered.

"Dad and papa won't ever hurt me either," he whispered. He yawned and curled up even more around his toy.

"You know why?" He whispered sleepily.

"'Cause they _love_ me—that's why," he muttered softly as his body finally gave into the urge for a nap.

Nightmares had continued plaguing his nighttime sleep hours, which meant that both he and Severus were almost always behind on their sleep. Thus, it was with little surprise that he soon found himself within the setting of a dream.

He recognized the place immediately. He was aboard the Hogwarts Express! He looked around and smiled as he realized what door he was standing next to.

A moment later, he found himself staring in amazement at the sight of his younger self's first meeting with Ronald Weasley.

 _Was I really that little and skinny?_ He thought to himself, looking down at his own arms in comparison. He wasn't huge now by any stretch of the imagination. In fact, that was another thing he and Teddy had in common; they were easily the shortest boys in their year.

But the boy that sat before him in this train car was positively miniscule. He swallowed hard and then looked over at the first year version of Ron.

 _My then best mate_ , he thought painfully.

Minus the few extra inches the red haired boy had put on over the last summer, the other boy was every bit the same Ron as the one from his memories.

"We look good together," a voice said from beside him, startling a jump out of him.

Another boy entered the compartment, sliding his thinner body easily around him.

Lee looked carefully at the boy and narrowed his eyes thoughtfully. There was something familiar about this boy.

The other boy was painfully thin. His eyes were sunken deeply into his face, ringed with dark purple skin—no doubt a result of troubled sleep, as Lee was also far too familiar with. The unmarked flesh on his face appeared to be stretched tightly around the bones of his facial structure; making the bones of his skull jut out prominently.

"What wrong?" The other boy interjected into his stream of thought. Lee jerked and then blushed as he realized that he had been staring.

"You look as though you've seen a ghost," the boy said.

_No, not a ghost; just a ghoul._

The other boy sat down next to the first year Ron without being noticed by the memory.

The thin boy had red hair.

Sure, it was a bit washed out looking, almost as though the boy had been very sick and lost most of his body's nutrients in a short period of time; but the meaning behind that red mop of hair was still palpable.

"Ron?" He whispered in shock as his mind finally made the connections between the two versions of the same boy.

"Hi Harry," was the other boy's comfortable response.

Lee felt his mouth fall open. His shock was so great that he didn't even register that Ron had called him 'Harry.'

When Ron had appeared in his nightmare a month ago, it had been the Ron from his memories—not the one sitting casually before him now.

"Are you dead?" Lee stuttered.

Ron barked a short derisive laugh.

"No. But I wanted to be for awhile."

"What happened to you?" Lee whispered.

"I was an idiot," Ron answered matter-of-factly.

Lee looked appraisingly at the Ron sitting before him. The old Ron would have never said such a thing about himself—even if it _had_ been true.

"Draco raped me."

Lee knew that—both Jimmy and his father had talked to him about it—and yet, it was still a shock to hear it come directly from Ron's mouth.

"And I was afraid."

Lee knew what that kind of fear felt like. His fear of Lucius had diminished over the past months to a nearly bearable level for most of his _waking_ hours, but the rest of the time it was still as bad as it had ever been.

"So I ran. And I didn't stop running until I was already lost."

Lee looked at his mate's face with new eyes. The other boy sat slumped in his seat; his shoulders rounded in defeat at the ordeal he had experienced. However, perhaps most hauntingly of all was the look in Ron's eyes as he stared nearly unblinkingly at him. They were full of desperation and regret, and they struck Lee hard.

"Say something," Ron said imploringly.

Lee swallowed hard, but he was unsuccessful in dislodging the lump that had suddenly appeared in his throat.

"I don't know what to say," he whispered.

"Say it's okay. Say _we're_ okay," Ron pleaded.

Lee opened his mouth, wanting to say all of those things and more, but nothing came out and he closed his mouth again.

"I can't."

He tried to ignore the small whimper that came from Ron's mouth at his statement.

"Then—," Ron seemed to be struggling for breath, "then I'll say this. I'm a bastard; a low-life that doesn't d-deserve an ounce of sympathy or—or anything else," he finished with a gasp.

Lee's insides were twisting in pain, but the image and the memory of horror from that night where Ron had violated the trust between them kept pushing its way resolutely into the forefront of his mind.

"Couldn't we at least agree to t-talk then? For real?" Ron tried once more, gesturing to the dreamscape around them.

Lee looked up and around them and noticed that the scenes from their first ride on the train had vanished, and they were now standing within a gray featureless space.

"I—," he started, looking down at his hands. An image of his father's hands blossomed in his mind and he remembered the man's quiet plea for him to give his friend another chance.

" _Young Mr. Weasley has nearly died on a number of occasions since making his way back to Hogwarts. Not only that, but he has also been in near constant pain the entire time. What else would you like him and his mother to endure before you are willing to forgive him?"_ The memory Severus calmly pointed out to him.

Ron just wanted to _talk_. He didn't have to forgive him yet. Ron just wanted to talk.

"Yeah," he said softly, looking up at Ron's suddenly hopeful face. "We can talk."

. . .

"Are you certain you are ready for this?" Severus asked Lee a few hours later. They were standing midway in the corridor that led to Ron Weasley's private room.

"Yes," his son answered resolutely. His child appeared unusually determined and focused; making Severus wonder what exactly had happened that afternoon to result in such a noticeable change.

"I'll be right here, if you need—oof!" He was cut off by his son abruptly grabbing him around the middle in a fierce bear hug.

"You're coming with me," his son _informed_ him.

"Oh I am, am I?" He asked with a smirk and an upturned eyebrow.

"Yeah, you are. If Ron really has changed as much as he—everyone says he has," Severus looked thoughtfully at Lee, "then he should be able to stand seeing you with me. You are my _dad_ after all," his son finished in a rush, an expectant look on his face.

"He doesn't have to accept me _immediately_ ," Severus attempted to reason.

"Yes, _he does_ , dad," his son said with a glare. "You're _my_ dad, and I love you. And if he can't handle that, then nothing is going to work between us."

Severus couldn't help the small smile that crept over his features at witnessing his child's fierce love for him; no more than he could stifle the feeling that filled his chest with warmth.

Then Lee grabbed his hand and began walking them to the room.

Severus allowed himself to be pulled along, curious as to how this was going to work out.

. . .

He walked into the room with his father. He knew that Ron couldn't hurt him here, not with Severus standing so imposingly behind him, but the memory of having his nose beat in still pounded heavily his chest, nonetheless.

It was all so clear in his mind; being beaten and then lying there broken in the dark, while Ron leaned over and touched _him_ —molested him!—through his pants. He swallowed hard, pushing the image away with no little difficulty. He was sweating a bit now like he had been in the hallway when the confrontation had occurred with Dean and Kenneth, and like then, he hoped that it wasn't noticeable.

. . .

Ron watched the unusual pair come into his room and he prayed that he could make it through their meeting without screwing up. This might be his last chance to make amends with his best mate.

"Hey, you came," he smiled weakly.

"I told you I would," Harry— _er, it's Lee now, right? I have to remember that!_ —replied a bit defensively.

"Thank you," he answered softly—gratefully.

Silence, and then a burst of words came from the boy standing at the foot of his bed.

"What you did was inexcusable," Harry— _oh wait—_ Lee accused, pointing a finger angrily at him.

Ron glanced up at Snape, where he was hovering expressionlessly in the dark corner, but the man didn't react to his look.

"Don't look at him. This is between you and me," Lee stated, pointing his finger in such a way that Ron could easily imagine being skewered with it.

"I know," he said.

"What were—," Lee choked for a moment, "what were you _thinking?_ You _knew!"_ He said through gritted teeth, inching closer to Ron with every word.

"You _knew_ what _he_ did to me. You _knew!_ " Lee's face was a bright red as he angrily ground out his words to Ron.

"How could _you_ do that to me?"

 _How could you break my trust like that?_ Ron heard what the other boy wasn't saying.

"I couldn't think—," he tried to say.

"You sure as hell didn't try to." The look in Lee's eyes was harsh, and Ron didn't bother to argue against it.

"I couldn't take being afraid anymore. I had to do _something_ ," he pleaded quietly.

"You should have talked to me."

"You were in the infirmary," he countered, remembering that night that he had spent lost in the dark.

"You should have _told_ me."

"And Hermione was so messed up," he begged.

"We were best mates."

Ron swallowed painfully at the past tense.

"I couldn't talk about it," he whispered.

"You _saw_ everything Lucius did to me!" Lee jabbed that finger into his own chest for emphasis. "Did you honestly think I couldn't handle it?"

"I—," he tried.

"Did you think that I was too weak to handle it?"

"No!" He argued, sitting up straighter in his bed.

"I was afraid that—I was afraid that you would think—," he stammered.

"Think what?" Lee demanded of him.

"Lucius kept hurting you, he humiliated you, and Draco just took me the one time," he wheezed, terror clouding back into his chest. "You were hurt worse than me, and I," he gulped a breath. "I was afraid that you would think that I hadn't really suffered, because it was just _Draco_. An _adult_ got you, and I got taken down by one of our _classmates_ ," he said, picking his way through his confession slowly.

"It wasn't a contest!" Lee growled at him, pounding his fists angrily down on the mattress by his feet.

"Damn it!" Lee shouted, punching the mattress angrily.

Ron saw Snape start forwards, only to be stopped by a wild-eyed glare from Lee.

"That bastard took _everything_ from me! He took my family! My virginity! My friends! My fucking _life_! What more does he want from me?" Lee ended his tirade on a sob.

This time, when Snape started forwards again, Lee didn't look at him. He just let himself be gathered into an embrace by a kneeling Snape as he cried.

Ron curled up, pulling his knees to his chest in a tight hug against himself. The other boy was right. He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named had ruined their lives. And there was nothing they could do about it.

"I need to go," Lee said shakily, after getting enough of his control back to speak again.

"Will you come back?"

Had he screwed up for all time?

Lee turned his head to look at him from where he was resting within Snape's surprisingly gentle hold, and he nodded silently.

Ron let out of a sigh of tentative relief.

"But I still haven't forgiven you," Lee whispered tearfully.

Ron hadn't expected him to. How could he forgive something of that magnitude? He couldn't even forgive himself. How could he expect anyone else to?

. . .

Lee allowed himself to be held down the hallway, and then he made his dad put him down. He knew that Professor McGonagall had been right that he was too old to be held by his dad, but he couldn't deny that it was a comforting sensation. It was okay to be held in their quarters, where no one else could see them and laugh or make disparaging remarks, but in the hallways, he had to act older—if not for his reputation, then at least for Severus's.

They were walking past a series of unmarked private rooms, when Lee heard familiar voices.

"Dad?" He whispered.

Severus cocked his head to the side, listening with a contemplative expression. Then he stepped right up to the door and knocked on it.

When his papa answered the door, Lee unknowingly copied Severus's expression as he tried to figure out what the man was doing there.

"Severus, Lee," his papa greeted them openly with a warm expression.

Lee didn't mean to, but when his papa had stepped forwards, he had caught a glimpse of the other occupants of the room.

"Neville?" He asked quietly, his throat still tender from his crying spell.

Hurriedly, he wiped at his face. Beside him, he heard his dad whisper some incomprehensible words, and moments later, he felt a refreshing sensation fill his eyes and lower the burn on his cheeks.

 _Dad is the best!_ He thought gratefully.

"Lee?" Neville responded from within the room.

"Come on in," his papa said, stepping to the side to allow their passage.

It was not a surprise to Lee that Neville wasn't the only one in the room; over the past few weeks, the slightly bigger boy had developed something of a constant shadow out of the small and permanently frightened version of Draco Malfoy.

At first, Lee had expected to feel revulsion for Draco; especially now that he knew the truth behind what had happened to Ron, but it hadn't happened that way. Instead, Lee saw Draco and only saw himself.

Something drastic and traumatizing had happened to Draco while he had been gone, but Lee didn't know anything about it, except that Lucius had been involved in some way.

After all the time spent with Severus, Lee knew how a parent was _supposed_ to act, and he knew that Lucius had not had an appropriate relationship with him even before Draco had been broken.

As Ron had pointed out, Draco was just a _classmate_ —not an adult. And no matter how messed up their classmate was, whatever had happened over the past few months seemed to be creating a positive effect within his life _now_.

Or maybe it was all thanks to Neville's influence; Lee honestly didn't know.

"How is it that you know these two boys?" Lee heard his father asking his papa.

"Bit of a long story, actually Severus. Suffice it to say, I told Neville that anytime he needed to talk, he was welcome to tell Poppy that I was to be contacted."

"Ah, that explains that," his father answered, sounding as though a large mystery had just been solved for him.

Lee looked at his papa and frowned a little at him. He didn't know why exactly, but the idea that his papa had put himself at the beck and call of Neville and Draco made him just the slightest bit jealous. He wanted to tell the man straight out: _You're my papa! Not theirs'!_

He had actually opened his mouth to say something—not anything as blunt as what his thoughts had been though—when Neville's face caught his eye. The other boy was looking almost _longingly_ towards Severus, and Lee turned around to figure out why.

Oh.

Severus still had his hand on Lee's shoulder—protectively. It was an outward sign to the world that Lee was _his_ and was not to be messed with.

Lee looked back at Neville and Draco and was ashamed at his brief moment of jealousy. He had _two_ parents and the boys in front of him had none—not any that counted anyways. So what if they got to have his papa to themselves once in awhile. He was just a person to them, but to Lee, Kingsley was his _family._

Kingsley was permanent in Lee's life, just like Severus was.

Lee dropped his eyes and slumped his shoulders sadly. Voldemort had continued to reach into their lives, even when they weren't aware of his doing so.

Voldemort had fucked with all of them, and for once, Lee wanted to fuck back a little.

"Dad," he said quietly, turning refocused eyes up at his father, an idea already forming in his mind.

. . .

Severus rolled his eyes inwardly at himself as they walked back to his quarters. He walked between Kingsley and his son—who was talking animatedly with Neville Longbottom. Trailing just behind the Longbottom boy was none other than Draco Malfoy; his son's former enemy.

Somehow— _somehow_ —Lee had convinced him to let the three boys "hang out" that evening in their quarters.

" _I can show them Lillian and we can help you come up with good pranks to play against the Dursleys,"_ the boy had argued.

And somehow, for whatever reason, he had agreed.

 _I am getting soft_ , he complained to himself.

But his son looked so much more animated than he had seen him look in—well, really all year. There was a spark of mischief dancing in the boy's eyes that previously would have made him worry, but now he took it as a good sign to Lee's development.

He hadn't even known that he had missed seeing that look in his son's face until it had miraculously reappeared that evening.

Beside him, Kingsley was smiling a knowing smile at him that he couldn't help but sneer at. That was the problem with having a lover that knew him as well as Kingsley did; he always seemed to pick up on the nuances beneath Severus's typically cold exterior.

It was damned annoying.

As they rounded the last corner that led to his quarters, Severus noticed that someone was waiting for them. It was a small someone—as someones go—and as they neared the solitary figure, Severus realized exactly who it was.

"Mr. Nott," he said icily to the small boy who had somehow managed to befriend his son.

Why on earth was this boy standing alone outside of his quarters? Hadn't he told his Slytherins—especially the younger ones—that they were not to be travelling by themselves through the corridors? And especially not after dark had fallen.

"Please do not tell me that you have been standing here _alone_ this entire time," he said, looming over the small boy with a menacing look.

"No sir," the small Nott managed quietly. "In fact, Millicent and Daphne were just here only moments ago," he finished.

"And why did they leave you here by yourself?"

"We heard you coming, and they didn't want to stick around to find out what you'd say, I guess," the boy answered.

"I will be speaking with them to verify your story, understand?" He looked sharply down. "I will also leave it to them to explain to me why they were frightened off by the voices of two Gryffindors," he continued, allowing a smirk to briefly grace his otherwise austere features.

While he had been speaking, he had also been touching the stones that would ultimately reveal the door to his quarters. Then he and Kingsley waited for their charges to enter before following shortly behind them.

. . .

Neville walked into his potion master's quarters with an awed expression on his face. How in the world had he wound up in this situation? Moments before, he had been talking to Draco and Kingsley about Draco's nightmares, and now he was in the heart of the dungeons, surrounded by Slytherins.

He watched Lee bounce around them, happily showing off his home, and he couldn't help but smile back at his friend.

"And this is my snake. Her name is Lillian," Lee said proudly, holding out a medium sized purple and yellow snake to them.

Neville had a toad, so he certainly wasn't squeamish about reptiles, but he wasn't entirely sure that this snake was safe enough for him to be casually touching.

"Lee," he started out carefully. "I thought that if something is coloured brightly, then that's a sign that they're poisonous?"

"Oo, I hadn't thought of that!" Was his friend's excited—yet worrisome—response.

"Hey dad," Lee turned away from them and went over to where Professor Snape and Kingsley were still talking near the door.

He turned around to make sure that Draco hadn't wandered off—he occasionally did that, and it worried him to no end—and was met with the soft amber eyes of the youngest male member of the Nott family.

"You're Lee's friend, then?" The other boy asked him.

"Yeah," Neville answered, pulling himself up straighter. "Is that a problem?"

"Only if you have a problem with me; I'm friends with him too."

Neville shook his head in the negative.

"You're a Slytherin?"

"Yeah, that I am—you're Gryffindor?"

"Yeah."

"Never saw myself being friends with a Gryffindor, let alone two of 'em," the serious look on the boy's face broke into a smirk. "I'd better not tell my father. He'd break my neck!" He laughed.

"And you're not worried about that?"

Theodore Nott shrugged.

"Can't do anything about it," he replied. "Hopefully my mum will intervene and let me stay with my cousins for the summer. She knows that we don't get along."

"I'm hoping that my Gran will let Draco stay with us this summer. He doesn't feel safe with anyone else, except—," he paused, unsure if he should tell this boy the truth.

"Anyone but you?" The serious look had returned and Nott was once again looking at him thoughtfully.

"Yeah," he answered quietly, not ready to say anymore on the subject. Luckily, he was saved from having to explain by Lee's reappearance in their conversation.

"Dad says that you're right and ten points to Gryffindor! For your, for your," Lee paused, thinking, " _astute_ observation!" Lee beamed at him, and Neville felt his cheeks burn with the suddenness of the praise.

"So you're not worried about being bitten by her then?"

"Oh no. She wouldn't bite me; we're friends. I can ask her though, if you'd like," Lee said with a grin at their shocked expressions.

. . .

Severus smirked at the ring of second year boys' suddenly shocked expressions. He had given his son permission to tell them about his Parseltongue skills; knowing that his son's news would instantly impress them.

A moment later, his smirk turned into a much more serious expression as his floo suddenly flared to life, and Minerva's head demanded for his presence.

Pushing past the ring of small boys, he quickly went to the floo, followed closely by Kingsley.

"Minerva," he greeted, only to be cut off by a stern look.

"We don't have time for pleasantries right now, Severus. Roger Davies has completely lost his mind and has attacked a younger student in the Ravenclaw dorm. He's locked himself and the student away in the fourth year's room and is threatening any who try to enter. I need your help with this. According to some of the students who saw him, he was frothing at the mouth. _Severus,_ " she said very pointedly. "The froth was reportedly _green_."

Severus and Kingsley had snapped quickly into business mode after her announcement and were ready to head out the door when a small hand pulled on the back of his robes, catching his attention fully.

"Dad? Is everything going to be okay?" His son looked at him with large fearful eyes.

Dropping to a knee, he placed both hands on his son's shoulders and looked at him with a serious expression.

"Son, I need you to listen to everything I say and do exactly as I tell you. You and your friends need to stay here in our quarters until I return. No one," he looked at the other three second year boys standing a respectful distance away. "No one is to leave. No one is to use the floo while we're gone. No calling Jayda and having her take you anywhere, understand me? Do not answer the door if someone knocks—not even if it sounds like someone you know."

"You'll be okay, right?"

"Remember what I told you in the infirmary?"

His son breathed in a deep steadying breath before replying.

"Poltergeist?"

"Correct," he smiled a bit at the boy, before pulling him into a short hug. Lee kissed him on his cheek as they separated and he stood back up. After ruffling his son's hair, he and Kingsley left, securely warding the door behind them.

. . .

Lee turned back to his friends a bit self-consciously. He soon realized that he needn't have worried.

"Snape hugs you?"

"In front of witnesses?"

"Is it nice being hugged?" That was Draco, voicing a quiet question that forced Lee to blink back a sudden influx of tears.

"Yeah, it's really nice." There had been a point not all that long ago that he hadn't known either.

He looked at the three boys standing in front of him and realized that he was the lucky one. Lucius might have raped him, and in turn caused him to doubt everyone and everything around him, but he had still managed to survive; coming out of it all with a family that loved him.

The three boys in front of him couldn't say the same thing. He knew that Neville's gran loved him, but he also knew that Neville yearned for more than just an older woman who constantly compared him to the man his father had been.

And Draco? His father had completely wrecked his life; breaking him into pieces from the inside out, until all that was left was a Draco shell.

Lee didn't know very much about Teddy yet, but he did know that Nott senior was a bastard of a human being. Teddy hadn't said much about his father, but it was obvious to him that Teddy despised the older man—a feeling that apparently was more or less mutual, if Lee's gut had anything to say about it.

And him? He had Severus and Kingsley—his daddy and his papa. And they loved him no matter what he did or didn't do. They loved him for _him_ , almost as much as the Dursleys had hated him.

Opposite of him, Teddy opened his mouth, ready to say something, but Lee never got to hear his statement, as the floo suddenly flared to life once more.

Lee stared at it in surprise. His father had changed the settings on the floo before he had left; there were only two who could come through now, and the only other person besides his father that was allowed was Madam Pomfrey.

 _Surely she's busy at the Ravenclaw dorm though, right?_ He wondered silently.

He watched curiously as Poppy stepped out of the floo gracefully.

"She's the only other one allowed through other than Dad," he said quietly to his friends, worry springing into his gut even though she was one of his most father's most trusted friends.

"Poppy? Why aren't you at the Ravenclaw dorms?" He asked, just before Lillian started hissing at him.

/Who isss that?/

/You know her. It's only Poppy/, he replied, not taking his eyes from the figure in front of him.

"Lee? What are you just standing around for? We need to go."

Warning bells went off in his head, and he took a step backwards while surreptitiously reaching for his wand.

/SSShe doesssn't sssmell like Poppy to me/, Lillian interjected with a brittle sounding hiss.

/Hide little one!/ Lillian hissed in warning right before Poppy raised her wand at them.

"I can't believe that Severus would leave you here by yourselves," Poppy said in her familiar soft voice. Under normal circumstances, Lee associated that sound with safety and care, but now the sound gave him chills.

"Something _bad_ might happen to you," the not-Poppy said before shouting, "Stupefy!" at him.

And then the world went black in Lee's eyes.

. . .

On the other side of the castle, Severus felt of a burst of absolute terror go through his link with his son.

Remembering how it had felt when his son had been attacked, Severus immediately turned and began running for his quarters. Kingsley was not far behind him and they made the trip in record time.

After hurriedly getting his door open, Severus quickly made his way into his quarters, wand held out in a defensive pose in front of him.

Lying on the floor next to the floo were two figures: Longbottom and Nott. Both boys had been stupefied, but were otherwise no worse for wear.

There was no sign of his son or Draco Malfoy in any of their rooms.

They had vanished without a trace.


	67. Terrifying Revelations

Severus tried to force himself to calm down. His mind was racing through the possibilities of what could have happened to his child and the young Malfoy boy; he knew all too well that time was of the essence now. The longer they were missing, the more likely the chance of their being seriously injured—if not killed.

He had to approach this logically—he had to approach this sensibly—he had to—.

"Severus!" Warm hands on his shoulders; stopping him from his agitated pacing back and forth across the room.

He blinked and realized that a concerned Kingsley was standing directly in front of him.

"I need you to calm down now Severus. We have to find him quickly, yes, but I can't do it without your help. Now I need you to think. How did they get to them?"

Severus looked down at their groggy witnesses, at his son's two friends. He scowled at the idea that someone had used a full strength stupefy on pre-teen boys such as these.

Pre-teen boys, like his son. The room spun around him, and he distantly felt Kingsley's hands again, pushing him into a seat just as his knees gave out.

"The wards on the door are still intact," Kingsley muttered to himself. "The wards for the route to your office are still intact; no signs of tampering with either."

 _The wards are still intact; the wards are still intact_ , Severus repeated in his mind.

And then abruptly, the light came on in his head and he looked up at Kingsley.

"The floo!" They said in unison, eyes dawning in sudden understanding.

"The only other person aside from myself who has access to the floo is Poppy," he said, standing up and striding over the empty fireplace.

"Madam Pomfrey was here sir!" Theodore Nott slurred out in the moment of silence following their revelation.

"Was she the one that attacked you?" He turned sharply towards the boy.

Nott nodded his head, instantly looking pained at the action.

"Don't move too suddenly there, Mr. Nott," Severus told him none too gently.

"Yes sir," the boy said in a near whisper.

"Wh-Where's Draco?" That was Longbottom's voice sounding just shy of bewildered.

"He has been taken," Kingsley answered grimly.

Under normal circumstances, Severus might have been privately amused by the look of utter astonishment that came over Longbottom's features then, but given the situation at hand, his reaction was shaded more by annoyance than anything else.

"Poppy wouldn't have done this—at least not acting under her own power," Severus said.

"Infirmary?" Kingsley asked, staring at him intently.

"Infirmary," he nodded.

Before leaving his quarters though, Severus shut down the floo completely and then cast _Morpheus_ on the two barely aware boys still left in his room. He levitated their limp bodies to his couch and then spun on his heel in a dramatic exit out into the corridor, where Kingsley was already waiting for him.

. . .

Lee awoke, disoriented and cold in a large dark room that seemed vaguely familiar, even to his addled mind. Beside him, a small creature of some kind was curled up in a ball, whimpering piteously to itself. Lee squinted into the poorly lit room at the small thing beside him, and nearly gasped aloud in shock as he recognized the identity of the person beside him.

_Draco!_

Lee put a hand to his face and was relieved to find that his glasses were still on his face. He shifted a bit from his spot on the cold stone floor and heard something clank. After more searching, he realized that the floor was not the only frigid thing touching him. Large rusted cuffs had been strapped tightly to his ankles, connected by heavy chains to the wall beside him.

Now he did gasp, his breath hitching in his throat as panic began bubbling in his stomach.

. . .

They found Poppy in her office, slumped unconscious under her desk, a trickle of blood staining the side of one cheek. Gently, Severus levitated her into the air, and then moved her to a bed in one of the infirmary's private rooms.

Severus waited for Kingsley's nod of approval before daring to enervate his mentor and friend. He did so as gently as possible, and then sat down in the conveniently placed chair located next to her bedside.

Her eyes finally opened, bestowing upon him a look of confusion, before quickly morphing into one of fear.

"Lucius!" She rasped, grabbing his hand with her own cold one. "Lucius Malfoy attacked me, Severus!"

Severus nodded in response, having feared as much after discovering the absence of both his son and the younger Malfoy.

"Where is Lee?" She demanded in a hushed whisper.

"Missing," he answered tersely; the tension in his neck and chest barely allowing him his voice.

"Merlin! No!" She moaned, her eyes roaming over both him and his lover. "You've got to find him, Severus! Lucius did not look at all well. I believe that's how he got the best of me," she finished, closing her eyes in regret.

Severus had only a moment to dwell on the implications of her admission, before being distracted by a sound by the door.

Whirling, his wand already in his hand, the man stopped dead in his tracks as he realized what had caused the disturbance. The wall behind him was shuddering, cracks forming in front of him as he and the other occupants of the room watched in silence. Beneath his very feet, the foundations had begun groaning, filling his inner core with an unsettled sensation; further amplifying the anxious feeling that had been present since learning of Lee's disappearance.

He felt a warm hand land atop his shoulder from where Kingsley stood, while another one touched his side, lower down.

The cracks in the wall continued spreading until the very stones began exploding; pebbles at first, and then larger and larger as the mayhem increased its volume around them. Curiously enough, neither he nor the other two present with him were affected by the dust, nor were they threatened by the shards of stone being propelled every which way throughout the room.

And then without warning, the cacophony abruptly ceased, and they were left in eerie silence as they stared into the dusty murk left before them.

. . .

When the voice from most of Lee's nightmares had begun speaking from out of the dark, he had been hard pressed to remain silent, but somehow he had managed it, despite everything that had happened thus far. He didn't want to give the bastard the satisfaction of knowing that his words were getting to him.

"My, you are a pretty thing still, aren't you?" Lucius's voice had begun with, sending chills down Lee's back. He had clenched his jaw in response and had managed to ground himself like his dad had taught him during their lessons together.

"I do like my whores to be thin as well," the voice had been nearer that time and Lee had begun to focus on keeping his breathing even. However, his efforts were made more difficult by the increasingly frantic cries coming from the blond haired boy beside him. Lee was forced to block out the sound of the other boy's agony; knowing all too well what might happen should he say the wrong thing _now_.

"I will enjoy having my cock caressed by your tight arse once more," the man stated, now only a few feet from where they were. Lee could very nearly see the shine of the man's unearthly pale hair, swaying around the aristocrat's cold features.

 _Dad is coming for me,_ he chanted to himself, trying to ignore the implications of the man's horrid words; putting off his fear for as long as possible.

"Tell me the truth," the man asked smoothly, walking right up to where Lee was sitting against the cold stone wall. "Have you missed me?" He asked crouching down in front of him, just as a grayish-green light filled the cavernous room.

Lee knew that the man was directly in front of him, but having his features suddenly appear clearly just before his nose was nearly too much for him to keep quiet about. Luckily, Draco did not have the same qualms as he did, beginning to scream and thrash about soon after the man's question.

"Draco, where are your manners?" The man stood swiftly, before kicking one dragon hide covered boot tip into his son's mid-section cruelly. The boy beside him yipped and howled for a moment, and then fell into a silence tempered by only his rapid and shuddering gasps.

"Ah, where was I?" The foul man turned back to Lee. Grabbing him by the front of his robes, he hauled Lee up and slammed him against the wall, keeping him upright easily as he shoved his chest right up to the boy's own.

Lee wheezed from the sudden restricting pressure on his lungs, but still did not say anything, barely looking at his rapist. He could feel the other's heart beating against his own chest, and without glancing up, he could the man's eyes boring into his skin as well.

"I believe that I asked you a question, _boy_. Well?"

. . .

The rubble and dust surrounding them had finally begun to ease when the figure appeared. Dressed all in black—actual cloth this time—and looking a great deal like the potion's master himself, Jimmy walked towards the three thunderstruck adults with a grim expression on his typically friendly countenance.

"Jimmy?" His potion's master asked in a soft voice.

He nodded firmly and then went on with his somber business.

"I know where Hermione Granger is."

. . .

Lee could smell the man's breath, and just as he had tasted before, it smelled of mint. He found that the smell of that combined with the smell of the blood leaking from his nose was not at all a pleasant combination. Lucius had viciously backhanded him when Lee had not answered his damnable questions, and although Lee had voiced a small cry of pain, he had otherwise kept his mouth shut—further infuriating the man.

"Let's see here, I wouldn't have believed it, but I do believe you've forgotten your lessons," Lucius smiled cruelly at him, and he felt his insides go even colder and stiller than he would have previously thought possible.

He watched surreptitiously as the man— _the monster!_ —reached for his wand and mutter something. Lee didn't know what the man had said, but it didn't matter as the results were quite clear.

Somehow Lucius had managed to banish all of his clothes, and he was now pressed chest to chest with the man, naked as the day he had been born. Now he did shiver—not from the cold, but from having the last of his defenses taken away against the feared creature against him. His helplessness was further emphasized as Lucius began running those long aristocratic fingers down his torso, murmuring appreciatively at each new body part they encountered; making the sick nauseated feeling in him grow until he knew he must do something— _anything_ —to fight back, even if he would be hurt for it.

Having no other options at his disposal, Lee closed his eyes and released his bladder against the front of Lucius's stylish and expensive robes.

. . .

"Where?" Demanded Kingsley, from where he was still standing next to Severus.

"Dumbledore's office," was the dark reply.

Behind him, he heard Poppy let out a long string of curses. Under more typical circumstances, such a rarity would have meant an acerbic comment from him, or at the very least, a raised eyebrow.

 _But this is different_.

"I would surmise that Dumbledore likely knows the location that Lee is being kept at then, as well," he growled, already heading for the door.

Smooth non-human fingers caught his elbow just as he was ready to exit, and he turned to look at Jimmy with a mixture of misery and anger plastered across his face.

"Severus," Jimmy said quietly, both in his mind and out loud. The simple phrase stopped him momentarily as he watched the humanoid form of the castle reach into an inner pocket of his robes and pull something out.

To Severus's keen eyes, it appeared to be nothing more than a small leather bag, about the size of one of his fists.

"Wherever they are, wherever Hermione has _been_ , it is somewhere that I don't have conscious access to. This will help me in expanding that consciousness. And in turn, I will help you against whatever foes you find yourself up against there."

The bag was pressed into his hand firmly. It had a bit of weight to it, but no definite shape—almost like a small bag of rice.

Jimmy responded to the look in his face with a quiet explanation via their mental link.

" _Dust from my oldest and deepest foundations,"_ was the short but meaningful statement.

Severus's eyebrows rose in amazement, knowing that the foundation of Hogwarts had been created with the oldest kind of magic. What he had in his hand was sacred.

"When you get there, upend the bag on the floor, and I'll be able to find you immediately," Jimmy said solemnly, speaking out loud once more.

"I will do as you have instructed," he answered, voicing the request a touch more formally than he would have done under other circumstances.

"And we'll get him back, Severus," Jimmy agreed. The magic was thick in the air around them as their promise to one another was solidified through the intensity of their honestly spoken words.

. . .

The cry of anger against him as Lucius realized what was happening was both horrifying and satisfying. And then it felt as though every nerve of his body was on fire, as Lucius dropped him to the ground with yet another whispered spell. He couldn't help but scream now, the intensity of the pain in his being only enhanced when Lucius began kicking him in the side, on top of the waves of misery still burning within his very bones.

Sometime later—Lee could not have even begun to guess how long—the misery and the wrenching pain tearing through him finally ceased. He was left gasping on the floor, tears stills streaming down his face, fogging up his glasses, while his muscles twitched convulsively.

"You little cretin," Lucius growled at him, the stain already gone from his front. However, Lee noticed with less than his usual level of speed that the smell had not been extradited quite as readily, and for this, he was most glad. As victories go, it was a rather small one, but it at least had gotten the hideous man's hands off of his person.

. . .

After tucking away the precious bag carefully away in the inner folds of his robes, Severus and Kingsley hurriedly made their way down the corridors leading to Dumbledore's office, leaving Poppy alone with the humanoid castle form.

Luckily, they did not have to deal with the trial of guessing candies in order to gain access to the circular stairwell that led to Dumbledore's sanctuary, as the gargoyle moved quite on its own after a silent request to the castle from Severus. Both had their wands drawn as they rushed up the stairs, the door at the top bursting open without their having to lift a finger to aid it.

The sight that met them was quite unexpected, and for a moment, both men stood completely still; their eyes wide in amazement at what they had found.


	68. Going Down

Neither his years with the Dark Lord, nor the years spent as a professor had prepared him for the sight that had greeted both him and his lover upon their rather dramatic entrance into the office of the headmaster.

Dumbledore was very much at ease, sitting away from his desk, the front of his robes open and revealing none other than the young Ms. Granger—the young and _naked_ Ms. Granger, as she performed a task that Severus thought better fitted to a secluded back alley than the much revered office of the headmaster of Hogwarts.

"Unhand her at once," that was Kingsley coming out of his shock, attempting to use his right as an auror to put justice to a very unjust situation.

"I'm not touching her. It is quite the other way around actually," the old bastard had the gall to say before laughing at them both.

Casting the first hex that came to mind, Severus watched in shock as the spell shot out across the length of the man's office only to fizzle to a halt just before it got to the front of the man's desk.

" _He is protected from attack within this office—magical as well as physical,"_ Jimmy's voice whispered in Severus's mind.

"Are we to understand that you were the one responsible for the disappearance of Ms. Granger?" Severus asked in his iciest voice.

"Hermione, stand up and face the rude men," Dumbledore said with a wicked glint in his eyes.

They watched as the girl obediently did exactly as instructed, not even bothering to wipe the mixture of drool and semen away from her mouth as she did.

"She's learnt some manners finally; can't you see that, my dear boys?" The man laughed again, and Severus felt himself grinding his teeth in reaction.

"What have you done to her?" Kingsley asked in a low voice.

"Anything I've wanted to," was the old man answer.

"And my son?" Severus asked, keeping his voice even by the barest of margins.

"Young Harry will soon learn who is really in charge," the man said with the darkest of grins.

"You bloody soulless bastard," Severus spat.

"Sticks and stones," the man stated in a playful voice. He pulled Hermione backwards until she was straddling his lap and began shagging her right in front of them.

"Tell me where my son is," Severus demanded.

The man ignored him and Severus stepped closer to his desk. He watched Ms. Granger's eyes as she was raped, and was disconcerted to see them staring blankly at nothing.

"Tell me where my son is _now_ , you old sodding wretch," he growled, his anger beginning to get the better of him.

"Look! I can make her orgasm just by instructing her to do so!" The old man said gleefully, as Hermione began moaning loudly.

"You son of a bitch."

At that, Dumbledore did indeed look up at him, bright blue eyes shining coldly in his face like shards of dirty ice.

"You distract me with your endless complaints," he said, sounding very different from his previous congenial self.

"Where is my son!" Severus growled in a final attempt, letting his accidental magic go a tiny bit. The resulting force was a small earthquake of sorts that rumbled through Dumbledore's office, upsetting small artifacts and knocking books off the shelves.

" _Flagro et al,"_ Dumbledore incanted softly, just before every particle around them suddenly burst into flames.

" _Protego_!" He yelled desperately, his voice doubled by Kingsley from somewhere behind him.

The roar of the flames was nearly as loud as Dumbledore's insane laughter as they fought to find refuge from the maelstrom of fire swirling around them.

. . .

"My father will kill you when he gets here," Lee said from where he was seated next to the wall.

"Don't be so sure of that. He's said the same thing many times in the past as well," the man sneered up at him from where he was currently molesting his son.

"He means it this time," Lee said with conviction.

. . .

" _Jimmy!"_ Severus shouted in his mind.

" _Head for the far back corner to your left."_

Blindly, Severus reached out for Kingsley and managed to snag his sleeve. Protego or not, Dumbledore's magic had always been stronger than his, and it was starting to get more than a tiny bit warm.

"Come on!" He shouted to his lover, pulling the man with him as he tried to follow the castle's instructions.

Finally, they were there, but there was still no viable exit for them to utilize. Around them, the burning storm rose in intensity, nearly cooking them within their small shielded space. Severus wiped the streaming sweat from his eyes, barely noticing it as he desperately searched.

" _Where is it?"_ He asked again, knowing that their time was limited.

" _Under your feet; stand face to face with Kingsley and give it a direction."_

He did that and then grasped his lover by the arm, before shouting, "Down!"

The floor dropped out from under their feet and they fell into blessedly cool, dark nothingness. The trapdoor closed up after them, leaving no sign that they had ever used it as it faded back into the floor seamlessly.

They hit what felt like several cushioning charms on their way down, before landing in a heap at the bottom.

For a moment after landing, they lay atop one another, gasping for air as their systems tried to adjust to the much cooler air around them. Kingsley was the first to make it upright, helping Severus to his feet moments later.

Severus looked around them and was bewildered at their surroundings. Besides the shaft that they had just fallen through, they were standing in a roughly hewn stone tunnel lit by an unseen grayish-green light. Spread out before them were many more tunnels, leading off in different directions, almost like a labyrinth.

"Where are we?" Kingsley whispered, his voice loud within the deathly silence surrounding them.

"I have no idea."

" _Jimmy?"_ He tried, only to be met with silence.

They were on their own.

. . .

Lee couldn't look at Draco as his father took him. He could only huddle to himself, thin arms around thin legs as he sought to keep warm.

"Don't help me," Draco had stuttered out to him when his father had begun. The boy's eyes had pleaded with him, and he had reluctantly nodded.

Now there was nothing to do except wait for his father to rescue him.

. . .

Severus was pacing again as he thought. Ahead of him was Kingsley, attempting various directional spells and failing miserably with each one. After giving him an unneeded warning not to get too far down one tunnel, Severus had chosen to ignore him in favor of their more pressing need.

He knew that his son had regained consciousness, due to his charmed link, which was miraculously still working. The child was clearly terrified, yet except for a few flashes of pain, was more or less okay thus far.

It wouldn't last long, he knew far too well. Lucius was too much of a torturer to allow anyone much reprieve. He had to find his child and he had to find him soon.

He rubbed a hand over his face wearily and checked the time. It was just after midnight. His son should be in bed. _They_ should be in bed. He stopped his pacing and leaned against the stone wall, closing his eyes for a moment as he thought about their typical evening routine.

True to his word, he had not once let his son go to sleep without giving him a kiss and a promise that he loved him. He would tuck the boy in against the cold of the dungeons, and he would lay his glasses to the side. Then, with a hand on the child's head, he would lean over and press his lips to the boy's forehead gently, whispering his love after he did so.

The memories made his eyes burn as he thought about the possibility of not having that sweet child in life anymore. He had to find the boy, Merlin help him!

He had to find a way to find him; if only he had thought of putting—. He straightened up, his eyes going wide as he realized what a fool he'd been.

"Kingsley!" He called out, rushing to where his lover was. "His glasses! His glasses were still on his face when Lucius took him!" He had caught up with his lover now and had him by the shoulders.

The boy's wand had been dropped and left behind in Severus's quarters—Severus had the precious object on him—but his son had still been wearing his glasses.

"They came with a built in tracker!"

Kingsley eyes widened as he took in what Severus was saying, but he paid him no mind, already whispering the last words to the tracking spell that would lead them to their son.

Suddenly Severus looked down as a bright blue line suddenly appeared in front of them, leading them back to the main opening. They followed it and saw that it was pointing towards the darker side of the cave. Severus hadn't even been aware that there were any passages there, but apparently there were.

. . .

"Don't touch me," Lee bit out angrily, slapping Lucius's hand away from his chest.

"You little shit," Lucius hissed, grabbing him by the neck and pulling him to his feet. Lee heard the clanking of the chain that connected him to the wall by his ankles. The sound of the metal being dragged over the rough floor was similar to the sound of fingernails down a chalkboard, and he had to fight to hold in his shudders.

"How would you like your _father_ to find you here dead?"

"You're not going to kill me. You would have done it already," he said bravely.

"We don't need your brain—little as it is—only your body, _boy_ ," the man said, speaking in smooth tones.

"My _living_ body," Lee spat, following his words with a swift kick that caught Lucius right in his groin. He threw himself backwards as Lucius's hand became clawlike, clearly intent on drawing blood. He watched as the man fell painfully to the ground, blood pounding bright red in his contorted face.

. . .

The path that the blazing blue line took them on was a rough one; forcing them to do more scrambling down than walking. Some of the pits that they came across were dark, regardless of how bright their wands burned. They wisely chose to avoid those spots, walking around them where possible and climbing or leaping around them where not.

And still, the path continued its descent.

They didn't speak much, except to bark directions at one another when necessary, or to ask for help when they no longer could move without fear of falling. Several times they ran their limbs into the jagged edges of rocks, each coming away with yet another bruise to add to their steadily growing collection. Severus dearly hoped that there would be a different way back than the path they were currently on. He couldn't see how he was going to do this with his son, especially if the boy was injured in any way.

Turning the corner in front of him, Kingsley suddenly halted, nearly causing Severus to plow directly into his backside. Stepping up beside him, Severus could see what had caused his lover's abrupt reaction.

His heart sank as he realized what they were standing beside. Their path had opened onto a cavernous pit that was far too wide to jump across and that stretched out far into the dark on both sides of them. On the other side of the dark cavern, their bright blue line waited for them, completely unconcerned as to how they would make their way over to it.

Severus felt his heart drop into his shoes as he realized that they would have to climb back up all of those dangerous spots that they had just climbed down.

That's when Kingsley turned to him with a determined look.

"I have an idea."

Kingsley explained his idea and then fell silent, giving Severus a minute to himself to think over what the other man had said.

"You can't be serious," was Severus's dumbfounded response.

"Never have I been more serious in my entire life, Severus," he said, pulling Severus close to his chest in order he might kiss the other man's chapped lips.

"Let me guess; this is some foolhardy plan that they taught you in your auror training?" He snapped, yet still pulling the other man closer to him as he initiated another kiss.

"No, this is a Shacklebolt original."

Severus thought over what the other man had suggested and then considered the other options that could possibly create the same outcome. There weren't any.

"How's your aim?"

"Better than yours," the other man laughed softly.

Kingsley's plan was simple: cast a feather light charm on Severus and then throw him across the pit.

"And you? What will happen to you?" Severus demanded.

"Call for reinforcements."

"The patronus—," Severus started out skeptically.

"Patronus has a very limited range, you are correct," the big man said, as he began rummaging around in the inside of his long coat.

"So how do you plan to rectify that little detail?" He demanded, claiming his lover's mouth as his own with a savage kiss.

"I don't," Kingsley dragged him into another kiss. "I plan to use an entirely different method altogether."

And then Severus forgot how to be worried as Kingsley dropped to his knees in front of him, undoing the front of his trousers with nimble fingers and proceeded to swallow him whole.

. . .

Lucius had cast the burning pain on him again and then had proceeded to break his nose. Lee sucked in blood with his air as he gasped from the horrible agony cast on him, which in turn caused him to vomit. He was still vomiting when Lucius began kicking him. Out of nowhere, a spell sizzled through the air, and Lucius abruptly stopped.

A cold voice broke into the silence then, dispelling his hopes of finally being rescued.

"Can you not follow _any_ of my directions, Lucius?" It whispered silkily.

A deep groan was its only response.

. . .

Severus was still riding the waves of the bliss following his orgasm when cast the spell on him. He was barely coming back into his sense of awareness when his lover picked him up and then proceeded to throw him across the pit.

He landed hard, rolling several times across the dusty floor, before finally coming to a halt some distance away from the edge. Biting off a groan, he checked himself for broken bones, and after surmising there to be none, he shakily got to his feet.

"You might have told me that you were about to do that!" He shouted back across.

"And have you complain and worry about it the entire time? Not hardly!" Kingsley shouted back, a pleased expression on his face.

"You never told me what your alternate plan was!"

"This!" Kingsley yelled, pulling a tiny rumpled object from his inside pocket. Severus watched in amazement as the object stretched itself out and took flight once around the cave, finally coming back to rest on Kingsley's fingers.

It was a tiny owl.

"Now shoo!" Kingsley said, waving his unoccupied hand at Severus. "Go get our son!"

 _Our son_ , Severus thought as he nodded solemnly at his lover; turning and jogging after the blue trail that was thankfully still laid out before him.

. . .

Lee had lost consciousness sometime after the second voice had entered his hell, but he had finally awoken again; his body crying out in pain and fear. His head ached dreadfully, as did his face and nose; while in comparison, the rest of his body barely registered.

"Shall I tell you about your fate, pretty Potty?" Lucius loomed over him abruptly.

Feeling ill and not at all up to playing the man's hideous games, Lee turned his head away from the monster's face and did not answer.

A warm hand brushed against his bare chest, and he closed his eyes in an effort to keep his tears at bay. He had never wanted his dad more than he did in that moment.

"The dark lord has come back from the grave for you. I should think you ought to be honored," the man cackled low in his throat. "He has chosen your body as his newest _host_ body. Just think—Severus will be forced to bow to you someday."

The hand moved lower, touching his ribs and finally his stomach.

"Doesn't that excite you?"

The hand had reached his abdomen and thus far showed no sign of stopping.

 _Please_ , he begged in his mind.

"No," he whispered, not daring to turn over and show Lucius his backside.

"Well, let's see if something else can't get you excited," the man said, reaching out his hand for Lee's groin.

"Please," Lee begged. He hurt so much.

"I believe the boy said no, Lucius," a new voice said from the other side of Lucius.

. . .

Severus had found his way into the large hallway with its black and white checkered floors and grand ceilings with barely a second glance around him. Quickly realizing how loud his feet were on the floor, he cast a muffling charm on his shoes and clothes, and then added a disillusionment charm for good measure.

Finding Lucius bent over the begging form of his son nearly made him lose the element of surprise, but he had managed to keep his mouth shut until he was right next to the platinum haired monster.

He dragged the other man away from his son and threw him to the ground, pointing his wand at the other before Lucius even had a chance to get out an indignant response.

"You bastard," he spat, and then cast the spell he had long hoped to use on the cruel manipulative sod now lying at his feet.

" _Sectumsempra_ ," he incanted; pouring a great deal of his anger into the spell against the man who had caused his son so much suffering.

Ignoring the screams that quickly turned into gurgles as the man's lungs filled with blood, Severus turned back to his son. Quickly undoing the buttons on his outer robes, he pulled the dark cloth off and then dressed his son in it. He gathered the boy up into his arms and held him tightly, kissing the boy repeatedly as the child clung to him and wept.

"I wanna go home daddy," was his child's one repeated plea. "Wanna go home, please."

He reached into his outer pocket of his robe and pulled out a vial of pain reliever, giving it to his son as best he could between the child's nearly uncontrollable sobs. He stood them up and felt his son wrap himself just that much tighter around his body. Beside them, he saw that Draco was at least still breathing, but before could conjure up a stretcher, a voice spoke behind him.

"What a touching moment."

Severus whirled around, holding Lee against his body tightly with one arm, his other holding his wand tightly in front of them.

"I should have known you were behind all of this," Severus growled, casting a weak non-verbal _protego_ as he did so.

Before them stood the wizened form of Albus Dumbledore, a small smirk resting on his lips that belied the dark cruelty swirling in his eyes.

"Why don't you put the boy down now, Severus? I'm sure we could work something out, man to man."

Severus declined to mention that he doubted he'd ever be putting his son down again—at least not in the near future.

"I think not old man."

"Did you know that the origin of the Imperius curse stretches back as far as the third century?" Dumbledore said lightly, beginning to circle them.

"It was originally used to consummate the bond between witches and wizards of arranged marriages," the older man continued when Severus didn't reply.

Severus could feel his son trembling against him, and wished that he knew where Dumbledore was going with this.

"What most don't know is this: the caster of said curse is affected by it as well, only in far different ways."

A bolt of energy shot past Severus's head and ducked them both down under it, reinforcing his shielding with a softly muttered word. His son didn't react any, except to hold on just that much tighter to Severus.

Something uncomfortable was pressing against his chest, directly where his son was pressed. Shifting his hand to grasp the cloth of his robe where the object was, he felt the outline of the small sacred bag that Jimmy had given him.

Ducking around another bolt of sizzling energy, Severus worked to remove it from his pockets, thankful that he had had so much practice with doing things one-handed.

"An orgasmic high of sorts can be reached after casting the Imperius curse a number of times in one day," Dumbledore continued spouting in-between his randomly placed hexes.

Finally pulling the bag out by hooking a fingertip around one of its drawstrings, Severus pulled it out carefully. Just before upending it, he caught Dumbledore looking at it.

"What's that?" The old man pointed at them with his wand.

"A friend," Severus said simply, emptying the bag out on the floor as he had been instructed.

It was gold-brown in appearance and instead of simply falling to the ground, it began swirling around them like a small vortex within the large windless room.

"You don't have any friends, remember Severus?" Dumbledore pointed out.

"Not true old man," he said warily.

"Who would ever want _you?_ "

"My son," Severus growled proudly.

"And you boy? You say the same thing?" Dumbledore yelled; his eyes suddenly full of hate and bitterness.

His son did not answer; his lack of response further serving to infuriate the already insane man. He began flinging spells and curses at them at random, putting a great deal more power behind the spells than he had previously been using.

The dust swirled around them at greater and greater velocities, passing by and over Severus and his son every time another hex was thrown by the dark wizard across from them, intercepting each and every spell. Finally Dumbledore stopped casting and the sacred dust began moving towards him like a swarm of hungry flies.

Unlike Severus and his son, it was clear that the older man did not find the dust nearly as harmless. He batted at it with his hand, becoming more and more agitated when it did not leave him alone.

Severus watched in wonder as the dust began to fly into Dumbledore's eyes, blinding him; getting under his feet and making him slip and slide as his footing became more and more precarious. Finally, the dust did the unthinkable and began to push its way straight into the man's body. Looking around quickly, trying to find an exit as this was going on before him, Severus did not see the exact moment that the colors within Dumbledore's body began to glow, but he did hear the screams that began shortly thereafter.

He could feel his son shuddering harder within his grasp and he began rubbing circles in the small back in an effort to calm the boy. In front of them, Dumbledore was no longer screaming, but his mouth remained open as though he was still trying to give voice to the chaos occurring within his body. What happened next made Severus especially glad that his son was not watching.

A dark substance began pouring out of Dumbledore's mouth, dribbling down his beard like tar. It was soon joined by the streams leaking from his eyes and ears, and although there was no sound, Severus could easily imagine the pain that the old man was in strictly from his expressions.

Severus conjured a stretcher for Draco, and levitated the boy to it carefully.

Dumbledore continued glowing, his skin becoming brighter with each passing moment, making the dark crud dripping from his body seem only blacker. Cracks had begun appearing out from where he stood just as the temperature in the room dropped significantly.

Severus's breath was now steaming, and he began looking for an exit in earnest when his son suddenly spoke.

"Jimmy! I wanna go home!" The boy cried out into the room that had begun breaking up around them.

Cracks had formed in the walls of the room now, and Severus had a sinking feeling that he knew where they were when those same cracks began spewing thin streams of cold water.

In front of them, Dumbledore dropped to his knees and looked up at them once more.

"Severus? What has happened?" Was all he managed to get out before crumpling to the ground; from his now prone form, Severus watched in horror as a dark spirit rose up and floated away into nothingness.

He could hear the deathly sounds of water rumbling somewhere around him, and decided to follow his son's example, lest they soon drown in this cold tomb within the lake.

"Take us home Jimmy, please," he said quietly, only moments before the last of the old masonry exploded around them. The water began pouring in, washing the place clean, but Severus, Lee and Draco were no longer there to witness its influx.

They had gone home to Hogwarts.


	69. An Epilogue of Sorts

Poppy looked at the trio sitting across from her in Severus's sitting room with a tired smile.

Three days had passed since Lee's kidnapping and the boy had barely let go of his father in all of that time.

 _Or maybe it's the other way around,_ she mused.

Beside them sat Kingsley, a man she had long been proud of. A man she would be proud to call her son.

"When will the ceremony take place?" She asked.

"This summer, after things have settled down a bit more," Severus answered; pressing a kiss first onto his son's head and then following up with a kiss to his soon to be bond mate.

Poppy smiled but didn't say a word about his unusual show of affection in front of her.

"Have you told any others?"

"We thought you should be the first," Kingsley said, gracing her with a smile.

"Thank you."

. . .

Minerva caught them in the entry way, shortly after dinner. After shepherding them into an unused classroom, she sat them all down and demanded to know the reason for why Poppy had been so happy all day.

Severus looked at Kingsley and Kingsley looked at Severus, while Lee—who was now sitting atop his papa's knee—blurted out the answer happily.

"Daddy's going to marry my Papa," he said with a gigantic toothy grin.

It was one of the first times Minerva had been shocked silent in many years.

"Brat," Severus said, looking at their son with an upturned eyebrow.

"Severus," Kingsley warned. "We were going to tell you," he offered, turning back to the still stunned professor.

"Honestly Minerva, I thought that you of all people wouldn't be hung up on the idea of two wizards—," Severus started, only to be silenced by a stern glare.

"I simply cannot believe that you, Severus Snape, Slytherin extraordinaire, is planning to marry a Hufflepuff!" She said, bursting into laughter.

. . .

Lee sat in his room with Teddy and Neville, talking to them about their summer plans. Severus and Kingsley were both in the next room over, and Lee's door was slightly open in order to hear their voices.

"What about Draco?" He asked, turning to Neville.

"My gran is petitioning the courts for custody of him," was the shocking reply.

"How did you get her to agree to that?" Lee asked.

Neville blushed and turned to Teddy.

"It was Teddy's idea. I told Gran that she should consider the irony of raising a Malfoy in a Longbottom household. Between that and the idea of finally being able to put some manners into one of my less well behaved cousins, she was sold," he said softly.

"Yeah Teddy!" Lee said, engulfing his friend in a hug that made the small Slytherin boy turn pink in response.

"And you Teddy?"

"My mum saved my arse. She talked some cousins of mine into taking me on for the summer, provided I promised to work for my keep."

"Where are you going?" Lee asked curiously.

Teddy looked at Neville with a grin, and Lee's jaw dropped.

"Wait, so are all of the pureblooded families interrelated or something?" He asked, scratching his head.

"Pretty much," the other two said in unison, before looking at one another and giggling.

"Am I a cousin?"

"Distantly, I suppose so," came his father's voice from the doorway. Lee turned and upon seeing him standing there, ran over to him and pulled him farther into his room.

"Did you hear that both Draco _and_ Teddy are staying at Neville's house this summer?" He asked Severus excitedly.

"I might have heard something about that," his dad said casually, smirking at the three boys staring up at him.

"Oh thank you sir!" Teddy exclaimed, completely out of character for his generally somber self.

Lee and Neville looked at each other in confusion.

"Gryffindors," Teddy said with a groan.

"Don't let Papa hear you moaning about the other houses like that," Lee warned.

"Kingsley can take care of himself, son. As for yourself and Mr. Longbottom, it is fairly conspicuous when the only two in the room that don't understand something are also the only two Gryffindors present. I'll leave Mr. Nott to explain what I meant by that," Severus finished, closing the door part of the way on his way out.

. . .

Ron took another unsteady step forwards. To his left was his father, and to his right was his mum, ready to catch him should he fall. Finally he reached his destination and presented himself to the family waiting quietly—for once—outside the Burrow.

"Wotcher Ginny," he said to his younger sister who was standing closest to him.

"Wotcher Ron," she smiled, and then enveloped him in a spine cracking hug. In his ear, she whispered softly, "If you ever scare me like that again, I'll hit you with the Bat Bogey hex." She was still smiling when she let him go, although he was not.

As though Ginny had managed to break the ice, the whole family was suddenly surrounding him, and before long, he found himself being dragged inside to the twins' room so they could show him their latest creation.

Percy even smiled at him and thumped him on the back in congratulations for making it back.

"It wouldn't have been the same without you," he said, a touch too solemnly for Ron's tastes.

"You're right," he said quietly, acknowledging the truth with a humble nod.

. . .

Kingsley stared in amazement at Minerva, thinking that it was her idea of a prank to get them back for shocking her the first time.

"Don't look at me like that, young man!" She admonished. "I am quite serious. They wanted me for Headmistress and I turned them down. Now they want you."

Kingsley turned to his lover questioningly.

"It would give me a reason to be around here a great deal more," he offered to the silent man beside him.

"Well, I have always wanted an excuse to say that I'm sleeping with the boss," Severus said wryly, surprising him enough to bark out a laugh and pull Severus in for a kiss.

. . .

As Severus lay in bed that night next to his sleeping lover, he found himself thinking over the events of the past year with more than a little amazement at how everything had turned out.

The drugs within their school were slowly being flushed out of the system, thanks to Poppy and the other healers they currently had on hand. Severus knew that they were damned lucky that Mr. Davies had collapsed before he could come through on his threat to harm the girl with him.

Then again, the threat had been a bit hollow, since the girl with him—a Ravenclaw girl by the name of Marietta Edgecombe—ultimately turned out to be involved with the drug scheme as well, and was therefore in no real danger.

True, Ms. Granger would be spending a great deal of time at St. Mungos for her immediate future, and Mr. Weasley was going to have to repeat his second year, but all in all, he knew that things could have been much worse.

 _And I have a son now_ , he thought proudly, happily holding the thought of his son's happy face in his mind.

. . .

Jimmy watched over his children as they slept within his rooms. One thing still bothered him about the end of the fight with Dumbledore, and he promised himself a conversation with Severus the next time that he could get the man alone.

In the meantime, what on earth had happened to Seamus Finnegan?


End file.
